DNA results are in

My father took a DNA test earlier this year, and his results came back this past week.  I am new to using DNA in genealogy, and it’s been an interesting learning experience.  I chose FamilyTreeDNA, primarily because they have the largest database of other users with whom to compare results – a self-reinforcing cycle.  They also offer the option of uploading results to two non-company-specific sites, one each for Y-DNA (paternal line DNA) and mtDNA (maternal line DNA), so I did that for both.  The 67-marker test was the highest Y-DNA test available when I ordered it, so that’s what I got.  My dad has a good match to one other person in the FamilyTreeDNA database, and none in the non-company-specific Y-DNA database.  He has a fair match to two people in the mtDNA database, but if I understand what I’ve read about DNA correctly, that test is much less refined than the Y-DNA test we did; it’s more like a low-marker Y-DNA test.  FamilyTreeDNA is currently having a sale on the much more refined mtDNA test (one that is more like the 67-marker Y-DNA test), so I’ve upgraded his test.  It will be interesting to see what the results are.

I wrote to the best match in the FamilyTreeDNA database, and to the two best matches in the mtDNA site’s database.  Two people have each responded once so far, the third not at all.  The Y-DNA results comparison says that my dad and the other 67-marker Y-DNA test-taker have a 44% chance of having a common ancestor within 4 generations, and an 84 and 97% chance, respectively, of having a common ancestor within 8 or 12 generations.  I have a paper trail for my dad’s paternal line back to the first generation in the Colonies, born c. 1642 and having lived in Connecticut.  That’s 9 generations ago for my dad, as some of his ancestors were born relatively late in their parents’ lives.  If the paper trail is correct, my dad’s paternal line is from England.  Interestingly, this match has a different last name.  12 generations ago may be recently enough for surnames to have been used; the FamilyTreeDNA site says there’s a very good chance that it is recently enough, but of course, it depends on how much time is between each generation in each line.  Regardless, I hope that this matching person writes me again.

Fortuitously, the results came in just in time for me to attempt to summarize them on my Father’s Day phone call to my dad.  He was more interested than I expected, and seemed nonplussed that the best match has a different surname than his.  He asked me to let him know if his best match writes with further information.  As I pointed out to him, because more people are having DNA tests done for genealogy all the time, there’s also a pretty good chance that someone who newly takes the test will match him at some point, just like he matched this other person who had already taken one.

This experience has also really illustrated for me me what I’d heard in lectures, about how the more refined the test the better the results are.  It’s sensical, but the matches list shows it very clearly.  At 37 markers, three people are the same match for him.  But all three have also taken the 67-marker test, like he did, and when you get to that level, one is a full step closer in genetic distance than the other two, meaning that the other two have less than half a chance of having a common ancestor within 4 generations (for example) as the best match, even though the 37-marker test shows them all as equivalent.

I’m not sure exactly why (I guess I didn’t read the fine print finely enough), but FamilyTreeDNA didn’t run my dad’s exact Y-DNA haplogroup via the tests I ordered.  So far, all the site’s results do is predict what his haplogroup is based on his matches – R1b1a2.  So when I ordered the on-sale upgrade for mtDNA, I also added a test for his haplogroup.   I haven’t read a tremendous amount on the haplogroup yet since it’s just a prediction, but what I have read so far isn’t particularly surprising; it’s a common haplogroup in samples taken in Western Europe.  The haplogroup has a new name as of this year, which shows how rapidly our understanding and categorizing of DNA is changing and refining.

My mom got more and more anticipatory as we waited for my dad’s results, till she eventually decided to order a kit for herself without my even asking her about it.  However, there’s a snag in the processing; FamilyTreeDNA currently says that the charges never went through, though the charges posted to her credit card a while ago by this point.  So the test is on hold while things get straightened out.  My mom was tested some years ago as an early participant of the National Geographic mtDNA genetic origins program, through which we discovered that she (and, being my maternal line, by extension me) is (are) part of mtDNA haplogroup J.  This is a much less common haplogroup in Europe than my dad’s predicted Y-DNA haplogroup.  The mtDNA test she ordered will provide much more detailed information than the NatGeo test did.

I do understand, however, why so many genealogists don’t much see the point in taking mtDNA tests at the current level of the technology.  My dad’s maternal line is stalled out for me in the early 1800’s, and I’ve gotten my mom’s maternal line back to the late 1700’s so far and have been taking a break from it.  But that’s not as far back as the best matches often match at this point in the technological development of DNA testing, and many other people, including my dad’s mtDNA decent-match who has shared her most distant known maternal ancestor with me, haven’t gotten their maternal line as  far as I have.  It’s just plain tough to research maternal lines in most locales in the U.S.