(I actually wrote this post once last night, but I put a data CD into the computer and when it opened in my browser I lost the post. Very frustrating!)

As a genealogist, I often enjoy the most random genealogical thoughts. For instance, the E-man is the 9th generation of his surname to live in the United States. His great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, Philip, was born about 1752 in Germany and arrived in America in 1770. He fought in the American Revolution and was awarded some large land tracts in New York. Interestingly, both the E-man and I carry his Y chromosome, which is passed only from father to son, and typically without much modification. All the direct male descendants of Philip, of which there are many, carry the same chromosome.

There is another type of DNA that is passed from parent to child without modification. Mitochondrial DNA, or mtDNA, is passed through the egg from mother to child, both male and female. But only the female children pass the DNA on to the next generation. Mitochondria are tiny fuel factories that create the energy each of our cells use. Since the ancestors of mitochondria were eaten and subjugated by our single-celled ancestors billions of years ago, they still contain a string of their own DNA. This DNA is also passed from mother to child without modification - we each carry exact clones of our mother’s mtDNA.

The E-man’s mitochondrial DNA comes from his mother, who got it from my mother-in-law. I can trace his mtDNA back to a woman named Susan who was born in England in 1830. My mother-in-law’s family has many many direct female descendants of Susan, meaning her mtDNA is surviving very well!
My mtDNA comes from a woman named Sarah who was born in England or Ireland in 1846 and then emigrated to the Caribbean.

Many companies now offer genealogical DNA testing. You can use use your Y-chromosome, your mtDNA, or your non-sex chromosomes to test the following:

  • Relatedness of two or more individuals (provided they share the DNA in question)
  • The presence of African American or Native American markers
  • The ethnic and geographic origin of your Y chromosome or your mtDNA. This test usually groups you into a haplogroup, or a branch of the human family tree that your DNA most closely resembles. See Oxford Ancestors, the most popular company through which this is done.

Back in 2003, my wife and I had our non-sex chromosomes tested by AncestrybyDNA to examine the mixture of ethnic backgrounds in our DNA. This process uses Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms, also called Ancestry Informative Markers, to trace tiny variations in our DNA back to the source of that variation. For instance, a G nucleotide at a certain spot in your DNA might indicate a European ancestor who passed that down to you.

This was my wife’s result:

This suggests that she has roughly 9% Native American ancestry. Here are my results:


My results indicate roughly 12% East-Asian ancestry. I found this to be quite remarkable until I discovered that Native American ancestry is often misinterpreted as East Asian (this makes sense since the ancestors of the Native Americans came from Asia on the land bridge).

So anyway, this type of genealogical DNA testing is very new and is still far from perfect, which it can never be. It is merely fun to use this technology while knowing that the results can vary wildly. Genealogical research should always be taken with a grain of salt. Remember that recent study that suggested as many as one in 25 fathers are unknowingly raising someone else’s child? That would really screw up my family tree!!