In my genealogical research, I have sometimes found myself missing the trees by focusing on the forest. I think it happens to many genealogists – we get caught up in the research, the dates, the places, and we forget that there was so much more to people than their vital statistics.
This can happen to [...]
Technology Review, an MIT publication, has an article entitled “Genealogy Gets More Precise: Rapidly growing databases enable a more complete picture of one’s ancestry.“ The article, which is relatively balanced, discusses some of the benefits and challenges associated with genetic genealogy testing.
Also check out the article and video “Mapping Out a Nascent Market” at [...]
Genetic genealogy has the potential to reveal information about your health (for example, DYS464 can reveal infertility and sequencing of the entire mtDNA genome can reveal mutations that are suspected of being associated with certain disorders). Although I usually don’t consider this possibility to be serious enough to discourage genetic genealogy testing, I [...]
A few days ago I wrote about John Reid’s “Where Has Your DNA Been” post at Anglo-Connections a few days ago. This is similar to another meme which has been circulating the genealogy blogosphere for a few weeks now, including “Where was your family in 1908?” at 100 Years in America and “Where [...]
Welcome to the November 4, 2007 edition of the Carnival of Genealogy. The topic for this edition was actually more of a question… Do you have a family mystery that might be solved by DNA? I offered to analyze a submitted post for questions or family mysteries that might be solved using genetic [...]
A recent paper in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology examined mtDNA extracted from the hair and nails of eight Inuit mummies. These essentially freeze-dried mummies were discovered in 1972 in a natural tomb at Qilakitsoq in the Uummannaq Municipality of Greenland. Using C14 analysis, the mummies have been dated to approximately [...]
Some scientists have hypothesized that Australian aboriginals received a portion of their DNA from an ancient hominid species called Homo erectus, which for a short time was contemporaneous with modern man. A recent study published in PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences) set out to answer this question by analyzing [...]
I was very surprised when genetic testing revealed that my maternal lineage was not European. I’m sure, however, that my surprise was nothing compared to that of two British women who recently discovered that their maternal lineage was of Native American descent (the original article is available through the BBC).
Doreen Isherwood and [...]
Want to know more about DNA, DNA replication, and mutations? Here are few videos that I thought might be helpful. Seeing a 3D animation of a biological process can be even more informative than reading about it.
1. DNA Structure I
2. DNA Structure II (a little more technical)
3. DNA Replication
4. PCR – Polymerase Chain [...]
The Guardian, a newspaper based in England, recently published an article about genetic genealogy entitled “The appliance of science.“ It’s an interesting article that looks at the pros and cons of genetic testing for genealogical purposes.
The journalist quotes Chris Pomery, author of the up-coming book “Family History in the Genes: Trace Your DNA and [...]
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