Most weekends BI-Gen will take a break from
the world of family history news and wander into other areas. This ‘Something for the Weekend’ feature will give myself and others the chance to
vent their spleens with an opinion-piece, to recommend a product or research
technique, or to simply show-off their expertise! Who knows what will find its
way onto the blog?
If you’ve an idea, run it past me - I'd
really like to hear from you. There is no need to be an expert, a published
author, or qualified in any way. If you've got something interesting to say,
get in touch with me at micksouthwick@blueyonder.co.uk .
This week we take a layman’s look at a specialist field ...
Genetic Genealogy: View from the Sidelines
DNA analysis is claiming an ever-greater share of the genealogy market,
and may eventually come to dominate our research thoughts and practices. Almost
every day I seem to trip over a new article, a fresh theory or a madcap,
speculative idea connected with this fascinating area of genealogical research.
And it is, frankly, bewildering.
Chances are that, like me, you only have a
very basic grasp of what this DNA testing thing is all about. Paternal line = Y-chromosome DNA, maternal line =
mitochondrial DNA, and the new-fangled autosomal DNA testing which seems
to be a bit of both, or neither, or whatever. You may, or may not, have taken
the plunge with one of the many testing companies – and may, or may not, be wiser
for the experience. You’ll certainly be a good deal poorer.
It doesn’t take much in the way of
‘googling’ to find any amount of guidance on the matter – scientific papers,
dumbed-down articles for the layman, and attention-grabbing presentations on YouTube
all vie for our attention. It’s an incredibly exciting branch of science, and a
one which is, remember, still very much in its infancy. Goodness knows what the
next twenty, fifty or hundred years will bring.
Some of the astonishing stories to surface
of late include…
- All humans are descended from a single female who lived around
200,000 years ago (‘Mitochondrial Eve’)…;
- … And that there was a ‘Y-chromosomal Adam’, too, who lived
around 100,000 years ago;
- Pretty much all of us without total-African descent have a bit
of Neanderthal in us;
- Research among chimpanzees has revealed that they are
incredibly more genetically diverse than the human race (that is to say, all humans are very closely related to one another);
- By identifying genetic mutations in a person’s DNA it will soon be
possible to pin an ancestor of theirs to a particular place on the planet
where that mutation was known to have originated.
They’re even talking about extracting DNA from the backs of
postage stamps, for goodness sake. It’s only a matter of time before we’re
digging up our ancestors to obtain DNA samples from the grave. Or has this already been done?
Exciting though this is, I’m not
sure I need to be told that I’m 0.85% Neanderthal, that my paternal line
originated in Northern Spain at the time of the last Ice Age, or that,
surprise, surprise, I’m actually related to everybody else in the world.
Tracing one single strand of your personal ancestry back to a village in
southern France sounds amazing, but is of no practical use to your research.
As things stand, genealogy DNA tests do not tell folk precisely how they are related – or even who their common ancestor
was. It must be used in conjunction with detailed, old-fashioned research to
get anywhere near. Mitochondrial DNA testing is especially useless for short-term relationships, and
Y-chromosome testing only slightly less so. Value for money it certainly ain’t.
But to an outsider looking in (like me) it seems that autosomal DNA testing promises much
more.
Here’s the big one, though. It is estimated
that within the next decade it will become affordable to have your entire
personal genome sequenced. And once that is done for a sizeable proportion of
the civilised world – in, say, a few decades time – then there seems no limit to
where science can take us genealogists.
Though a ‘world family tree’ may in theory
be possible, I shouldn’t think we’ll ever get there. But it’ll be fun trying.
Mick Southwick
P.S. Your thoughts, please...
