22 September 2008 – 7:29 am
Journalist Maggie Greenhouse writes an entertaining article about genetic genealogy entitled “Who Do You Think You Are? Company Can Help Trace Genetic Ancestry” (Houston Chronicle, Sept. 19, 2008) . Much of the article is about Oxford Ancestors (OA), a genetic genealogy company based in England, but the article also mentions some companies in the […]
10 September 2008 – 8:35 am
Yesterday I wrote about 23andMe’s decision to lower their price to $399 (down from $999) while adding more genealogically-relevant SNPs and partnering with Ancestry.com. Although I don’t have any further information about the new SNPs, I’ve seen a couple of interesting articles about the price drop around the blogosphere.
Aaron Rowe at Wired science writes […]
9 September 2008 – 7:08 am
23andMe just announced that the price of their service has dropped from $999 to $399. According to an article in the San Francisco Chronicle, the company lowered the price of testing to attract more customers and increase the size of their database. The article maintains that 23andMe will still bring in profit from […]
8 September 2008 – 8:44 am
Knome, a personal genomics company that launched within the past year, has just delivered the first genomic sequencing to customers according to a report in the MIT Technology Review.
After paying $350,000 for sequencing, customers receive their genetic sequence on an 8-gigabyte USB drive in an engraved silver box. The USB is encrypted and contains […]
According to a 200-year-old family legend, Bettye Kearse - an African American - is the direct descendant of James Madison. Madison, of course, was a founding father and fourth President of the United States. As the story goes, he fathered a child name Jim with a slave cook named Coreen. For the past 4 […]
Yesterday, DNA Heritage issued a press release (reproduced below) regarding an opinion issued by the UK Intellectual Property. The opinion (available here) was the result of inquiry into whether claims 4-7 of a 2004 patent in England are valid. The patent, held by Bryan Sykes of Oxford Ancestors, was issued in 2004 and is […]
The eighth edition of the TGG Interview Series is with Max Blankfeld. Max is Vice-President of Marketing and Operations at Family Tree DNA, one of the largest genetic genealogy companies in the world. In addition, together with Bennett Greenspan, Max launched DNA Traits, a company that tests DNA for genetic diseases and inherited […]
On June 9, 2008, the California Department of Public Health sent cease and desist letters to 13 companies that offer genetic testing. According to the letters, the companies are in violation of certain sections of the Business and Professions Code of California, including offering “a clinical laboratory test directly to the consumer without […]
For new readers of The Genetic Genealogist, 23andMe is a personal genomics company that offers a service to examine more than 600,000 SNPs throughout an individual’s genome. The information is then used to analyze ancestry (using Y-DNA and mtDNA) and to estimate propensity for disease. For much more info about 23andMe […]
The Quantified Self has a follow-up to last week’s post about the reproducibility of SNP testing by 23andMe and deCODEme using Illumina SNP chips (see the Quantified Self’s post and my post). In that post, it was revealed that two comparisons of the 560,000 overlapping SNP results from the two different companies had […]
Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak recently wrote “I’m a Euro-Mutt!” about the results of her AncestrybyDNA EuropeanDNA 2.0 test (from DNAPrint Genomics). Megan found that the results of her test were both expected and surprising! From DNAPrint Genomics’ website:
DNAPrint® Genomics’ powerful new EuropeanDNA 2.0 product, further elucidates European sub-ancestry using 1,349 European Ancestry Informative Markers […]
Update: See the related story in GenomeWeb News (free sub. required).
Forbes.com published an article today entitled “States Crack Down On Online Gene Tests” that examines New York state’s response to the recent launch of direct-to-consumer (DTC) genetic testing services by companies such as 23andMe, deCODEme, SeqWright, and Navigenics, as well as the behind-the-scenes companies […]
Navigenics, a genome scanning company, officially launches their genome service today - called the “Navigenics Health Compass”, with a cocktail reception in NYC tonight at 6:00PM. Thomas Goetz of Epidemix writes an article in Wired today about some of the differences between Navigenics and other large-scale genome scanning companies.
The launch is also mentioned […]
MSNBC has a very short article entitled "DNA Testing: Would You Do It?" Last Friday, Linda Avey and Anne Wojcicki - co-founders of 23andMe - were interviewed by NBC News Correspondent Peter Alexander and Today show host Ann Curry to discuss the company. The 7.5 minute video is below:
The “Starting a Business” section of the online bizjournals site has an article called “Riding the Revolution” that reviews the success of the entrepreneurs behind the popular Family Tree DNA (who recently launched a new company called DNATraits).
The company was founded in April 2000 and is led by president Bennett Greenspan and chief operating […]
Family Tree DNA announces a new SNP product for members of the R1b Y-chromosome haplogroup. The following was posted at the DNA-NEWBIE Yahoogroup by Max Blankfeld, Vice-President of Operations and Marketing at FTDNA:
Many of you have asked about, and have quoted Bennett Greenspan’s comment at the 4th Annual FTDNA Conference on Genetic […]
29 February 2008 – 3:00 am
With the popular African American Lives series on PBS and numerous news stories and magazine columns, Black History Month often results in increased attention to the genealogy and genetic history of African Americans. I saw a similar increased interest in genetic genealogy last February as well.
The Multiracial Roots of Americans
Diverse has an article […]
26 February 2008 – 9:53 am
Earlier today I posted about the recent updates to the 23andMe service, including an enhanced Gene Journal section and the new Paternal Ancestry.
To get a much more thorough analysis of these new additions, read David P. Hamilton’s “23andMe makes genomics personal — and slick” at VentureBeat: lifesciences. Hamilton’s articles are always insightful […]
26 February 2008 – 3:00 am
The Spittoon (23andMe’s blog) announces their new paternal ancestry tool. The information was already obtained from all male participants, so no further sampling is needed. I’m not sure which SNPs they are using to determine haplogroup status, but I’ll look into it.
The Gene Journal (here) adds 30 conditions and traits to bring […]
20 February 2008 – 10:00 pm
Bennett Greenspan and Max Blankfeld [I apologize for the previous misspelling of Greenspan’s and Blankfeld’s names] of the genetic genealogy testing company Family Tree DNA have launched a new service called DNATraits to examine a customer’s DNA for evidence of genetic disease. According to the website, DNATraits:
“provides direct-to-consumer genetic data from tests conducted […]
