Which DNA Test Should I Buy? And Why?

Posted on June 21, 2023 by Roberta Estes

Which DNA test should I buy, and why?

I receive questions like this often. As a reminder, I don’t take private clients anymore, which means I don’t provide this type of individual consulting or advice. However, I’m doing the next best thing! In this article, I’m sharing the step-by-step process that I utilize to evaluate these questions so you can use the process too.

It’s important to know what questions to ask and how to evaluate each situation to arrive at the best answer for each person.

Here’s the question I received from someone I’ll call John. I’ve modified the wording slightly and changed the names for privacy.

I’m a male, and my mother was born in Charleston, SC. My maternal grandmother’s maiden name was Jones and a paternal surname was Davis. The family was supposed to have been Black, Dutch, Pennsylvania Dutch, and Scots-Irish…only once was I told I was 3/16 Indian, with Davis being 3/4 and Jones being full Indian.

Do I have enough reasonable information to buy a test, and which one?

Please note that it’s common for questions to arrive without all the information you need to provide a sound answer – so it’s up to you to ask those questions and obtain clarification.

Multiple Questions

There are actually multiple questions here, so let me parse this a bit.

John never mentioned what his testing goal was.
He also never exactly said how the paternal line of Davis was connected, so I’ve made an assumption. For educational purposes, it doesn’t matter because we’re going to walk through the evaluation process, which is the same regardless.
John did not include a tree or a link to a tree, so I created a rudimentary tree to sort through this. I need the visuals and normally just sketch it out on paper quickly.
Does John have enough information to purchase a test?
If so, which test?

There is no “one size fits all” answer, so let’s discuss these one by one.

Easy Answers First

The answer to #4 is easy.

Anyone with any amount of information can purchase a DNA test. Adoptees do it all the time, and they have no prior information.

So, yes, John can purchase a test.

The more difficult question is which test, because that answer depends on John’s goals and whether he’s just looking for some quick information or really wants to delve into genealogy and learn. Neither approach is wrong.

Many people think they want a quick answer – and then quickly figure out that they really want to know much more about their ancestors.

I wrote an article titled DNA Results – First Glances at Ethnicity and Matching for new testers, here.

Goals

Based on what John said, I’m going to presume his goals are probably:

To prove or disprove the family oral history of Black, Dutch, Pennsylvania Dutch (which is actually German,) Scots-Irish, and potentially Native American.
John didn’t mention actual genealogy, which would include DNA matches and trees, so we will count that as something John is interested in secondarily. However, he may need genealogy records to reach his primary goal.

If you’re thinking, “The process of answering this seemingly easy question is more complex than I thought,” you’d be right.

Ethnicity in General

It sounds like John is interested in ethnicity testing. Lots of people think that “the answer” will be found there – and sometimes they are right. Often not so much. It depends.

The great news is that John really doesn’t need any information at all to take an autosomal DNA test, and it doesn’t matter if the test-taker is male or female.

To calculate each tester’s ethnicity, every testing company compiles their own reference populations, and John will receive different results at each of the major companies. Each company updates their ethnicity results from time to time as well, and they will change.

Additionally, each company provides different tools for their customers.

The ethnicity results at different companies generally won’t match each other exactly, and sometimes the populations look quite different.

Normally, DNA from a specific ancestor can be found for at least 5 or 6 generations. Of course, that means their DNA, along with the DNA from all of your other ancestors is essentially combined in a communal genetic “pot” of your chromosomes, and the DNA testing company needs to sort it out and analyze your DNA for ethnicity.

DNA descended from ancestors, and their populations, further back in people’s trees may not be discerned at all using autosomal DNA tests.

A much more specific “ethnicity” can be obtained for both the Y-DNA line, which is a direct patrilineal line for men (blue arrow,) and the mitochondrial DNA line (pink arrows,) which is a direct matrilineal line for everyone, using those specific tests.

We will discuss both of those tests after we talk about the autosomal tests available from the four major genealogy DNA testing companies. All of these tools can and should be used together.

Let’s Start with Native American

Let’s evaluate the information that John provided.

John was told that he “was 3/16 Indian, with Davis being 3/4 and Jones being full Indian.”

We need to evaluate this part of his question slightly differently.

I discussed this in the article, Ancestral DNA Percentages – How Much of Them is in You?

First, we need to convert generations to 16^ths.

You have two ancestors in your parent’s generation, four in your grandparents, and so forth. You have 16 great-great-grandparents. So, if John was 3/16^th Native, then three of his great-great-grandparents would have been fully Native, or an equivalent percentage. In other words, six ancestors in that generation could have been half-Native. Based on what John said, they would have come from his mother’s side of the tree. John is fortunate to have that much information to work with.

He told us enough about his tree that we can evaluate the statement that he might be 3/16^ths Native.

Here’s the tree I quickly assembled in a spreadsheet based on John’s information.

His father, at left, is not part of the equation based on the information John provided.

On his mother’s side, John said that Grandfather Davis is supposed to be three-quarters Native, which translates to 12/16^ths. Please note that it would be extremely beneficial to find a Y-DNA tester from his Davis line, like one of his mother’s brothers, for example.

John said that his Grandmother Jones is supposed to be 100% Native, so 16/16^ths.

Added together, those sum to 28/32, which reduces down to 14/16^th or 7/8^th for John’s mother.

John would have received half of his autosomal DNA from his mother and half from his non-Native father. That means that if John’s father is 100% non-Native, John would be half of 14/16^ths or 7/16^ths, so just shy of half Native.

Of course, we know that we don’t always receive exactly 50% of each of our ancestors’ DNA (except for our parents,) but we would expect to see something in the ballpark of 40-45% Native for John if his grandmother was 100% Native and his grandfather was 75%.

Using simple logic here, for John’s grandmother to be 100% Native, she would almost assuredly have been a registered tribal member, and the same if his grandfather was 75% Native. I would think that information would be readily available and well-known to the family – so I doubt that this percentage is accurate. It would be easy to check, though, on various census records during their lifetimes where they would likely have been recorded as “Indian.” They might have been in the special “Indian Census” taken and might be living on a reservation.

It should also be relatively easy to find their parents since all family members were listed every ten years in the US beginning with the 1850 census.

The simple answer is that if John’s grandparents had as much Native as reported, he would be more than 3/16^th – so both of these factoids cannot simultaneously be accurate. But that does NOT mean neither is accurate.

John could be 7/8^th or 40ish%, 3/16^th or 18ish%, or some other percentage. Sometimes, where there is smoke, there is fire. And that seems to be the quandary John is seeking to resolve.

Would Ethnicity/Population Tests Show This Much Native?

Any of the four major testing companies would show Native for someone whose percentage would be in the 40% or 18% ballpark.

The easiest ethnicities to tell apart from one another are continental-level populations. John also stated that he thinks he may also have Black ancestry, plus Dutch, Pennsylvania Dutch (German), and Scots-Irish. It’s certainly possible to verify that using genealogy, but what can DNA testing alone tell us?

How far back can we expect to find ethnicities descending from particular ancestors?

In this table, you can see at each generation how many ancestors you have in that generation, plus the percentage of DNA, on average, you would inherit from each ancestor.

All of the major DNA testing companies can potentially pick up small trace percentages, but they don’t always. Sometimes one company does, and another doesn’t. So, if John has one sixth-generation Native American ancestor, he would carry about 1.56% Native DNA, if any.

Sometimes a specific ethnicity is not found because, thanks to random recombination, you didn’t inherit any of that DNA from those ancestors. This is why testing your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and siblings can be very important. They share your same ancestors and may have inherited DNA that you didn’t that’s very relevant to your search.
Sometimes it’s not found because the reference populations and algorithms at that testing company aren’t able to detect that population or identify it accurately, especially at trace levels. Every DNA testing company establishes their own reference populations and writes internal, proprietary ethnicity analysis algorithms.
Sometimes it’s not found because your ancestor wasn’t Native or from that specific population.
Sometimes it’s there, but your population is called something you don’t expect.

For example, you may find Scandinavian when your ancestor was from England or Ireland. The Vikings raided the British Isles, so while some small amount of Scandinavian is not what you expect, that doesn’t mean it‘s wrong. However, if all of your family is from England, it’s not reasonable to have entirely Scandinavian ethnicity results.

It’s also less likely as each generation passes by that the information about their origins gets handed down accurately to following generations. Most non-genealogists don’t know the names of their great-grandparents, let alone where their ancestors were from.

Using a 25-year average generation length, by the 4^th generation, shown in the chart above, you have 16 ancestors who lived approximately 100 years before your parents were born, so someplace in the mid-1800s. It’s unlikely for oral history from that time to survive intact. It’s even less likely from a century years earlier, where in the 7^th generation, you have 128 total ancestors.

The best way to validate the accuracy of your ethnicity estimates is by researching your genealogy. Of course, you need to take an ethnicity test, or two, in order to have results to validate.

Ethnicity has a lot more to offer than just percentages.

Best Autosomal Tests for Native Ethnicity

Based on my experience with people who have confirmed Native ancestry, the two best tests to detect Native American ethnicity, especially in smaller percentages, are both FamilyTreeDNA and 23andMe.

Click images to enlarge

In addition to percentages, both 23andMe and FamilyTreeDNA provide chromosome painting for ethnicity, along with segment information in download files. In other words, they literally paint your ethnicity results on your chromosomes.

They then provide you with a file with the “addresses” of those ethnicities on your chromosomes, which means you can figure out which ancestors contributed those ethnicity segments.

The person in the example above, a tester at FamilyTreeDNA, is highly admixed with ancestors from European regions, African regions and Native people from South America.

Trace amounts of Native American with a majority of European heritage would appear more like this.

You can use this information to paint your chromosome segments at DNAPainter, along with your matching segments to other testers where you can identify your common ancestors. This is why providing trees is critically important – DNA plus ancestor identification with our matches is how we confirm our ancestry.

This combination allows you to identify which Native (or another ethnicity) segments descended from which ancestors. I was able to determine which ancestor provided that pink Native American segment on chromosome 1 on my mother’s side.

I’ve provided instructions for painting ethnicity segments to identify their origins in specific ancestors, here.

Autosomal and Genealogy

You may have noticed that we’ve now drifted into the genealogy realm of autosomal DNA testing. Ethnicity is nice, but if you want to know who those segments came from, you’ll need:

Autosomal test matching to other people
To identify your common ancestor with as many matches as you can
To match at a company who provides you with segment information for each match
To work with DNAPainter, which is very easy

The great news is that you can do all of that using the autosomal tests you took for ethnicity, except at Ancestry who does not provide segment information.

Best Autosomal Test for Matching Other Testers

The best autosomal test for matching may be different for everyone. Let’s look at some of the differentiators and considerations.

If you’re basing a testing recommendation solely on database size, which will probably correlate to more matches, then the DNA testing vendors fall into this order:

If you’re basing that recommendation on the BEST, generally meaning the closest matches for you, there’s no way of knowing ahead of time. At each of the four DNA testing companies, I have very good matches who have not tested elsewhere. If I weren’t in all four databases, I would have missed many valuable matches.

If you’re basing that recommendation on which vendor began testing earliest, meaning they have many tests from people who are now deceased, so you won’t find their autosomal tests in other databases that don’t accept uploads, the recommended testing company order would be:

FamilyTreeDNA with tests from people who originally tested two decades ago.
23andMe
Ancestry
MyHeritage

If you’re basing that recommendation on matches to people who live in other countries, the order would be:

Ancestry and 23andMe are very distant third/fourth because they did not sell widely outside the US initially and still don’t sell in as many countries as the others, meaning their testers’ geography is more limited. However, Ancestry is also prevalent in the UK.

If you’re basing that recommendation on segment information and advanced tools that allow you to triangulate and confirm your genetic link to specific ancestors, the order would be:

Ancestry does NOT provide any segment information.

If you’re basing that recommendation on unique tools provided by each vendor, every vendor has something very beneficial that the others don’t.

In other words, there’s really no clear-cut answer for which single autosomal DNA test to order. The real answer is to be sure you’re fishing in all the ponds. The fish are not the same. Unique people test at each of those companies daily who will never be found in the other databases.

Test at or upload your DNA to all four DNA testing companies, plus GEDmatch. Step-by-step instructions for downloading your raw data file and uploading it to the DNA testing companies who accept uploads can be found, here.

Test or Upload

Not all testing companies accept uploads of raw autosomal DNA data files from other companies. The good news is that some do, and it’s free to upload and receive matches.

Two major DNA testing companies DO NOT accept uploads from other companies. In other words, you have to test at that company:

Two testing companies DO accept uploads from the other three companies. Uploads and matching are free, and advanced features can be unlocked very cost effectively.

FamilyTreeDNA – free matching and $19 unlock for advanced features
MyHeritage – free matching and $29 unlock.for advanced features

I recommend testing at both 23andMe and Ancestry and uploading one of those files to both FamilyTreeDNA and MyHeritage, then purchasing the respective unlocks.

GEDmatch

GEDmatch is a third-party matching site, not a DNA testing company. Consider uploading to GEDmatch because you may find matches from Ancestry who have uploaded to GEDmatch, giving you access to matching segment information.

Other Types of DNA

John provided additional information that may prove to be VERY useful. Both Y-DNA and mitochondrial DNA can be tested as well and may prove to be more useful than autosomal to positively identify the origins of those two specific lines.

Let’s assume that John takes an autosomal test and discovers that indeed, the 3/16^th Native estimate was close. 3/16^th equates to about 18% Native which would mean that three of his 16 great-great-grandparents were Native.

John told us that his Grandmother Jones was supposed to be 100% Native.

At the great-great-grandparent level, John has 16 ancestors, so eight on his mother’s side, four from maternal grandmother Jones and four from his maternal grandfather Davis.

John carries the mitochondrial DNA of his mother (red boxes and arrows,) and her mother, through a direct line of females back in time. John also carries the Y-DNA of his father (dark blue box, at left above, and blue arrows below.)

Unlike autosomal DNA which is admixed in every generation, mitochondrial DNA (red arrows) is inherited from that direct matrilineal line ONLY and never combines with the DNA of the father. Mothers give their mitochondrial DNA to both sexes of their children, but men never contribute their mitochondrial DNA to offspring. Everyone has their mother’s mitochondrial DNA.

Because it never recombines with DNA from the father, so is never “watered down,” we can “see” much further back in time, even though we can’t yet identify those ancestors.

However, more importantly, in this situation, John can test his own mitochondrial DNA that he inherited from his mother, who inherited it from her mother, to view her direct matrilineal line.

John’s mitochondrial DNA haplogroup that will be assigned during testing tells us unquestionably whether or not his direct matrilineal ancestor was Native on her mother’s line, or not. If not, it may well tell us where that specific line originated.

You can view the countries around the world where Y-DNA haplogroups are found, here, and mitochondrial haplogroups, here.

If John’s mitochondrial DNA haplogroup is Native, that confirms that one specific line is Native. If he can find other testers in his various lines to test either their Y-DNA or mitochondrial DNA, John can determine if other ancestors were Native too. If not, those tests will reveal the origins of that line, separate from the rest of his genealogical lines.

Although John didn’t mention his father’s line, if he takes a Y-DNA test, especially at the Big Y-70 0 level, that will also reveal the origins of his direct paternal line. Y-DNA doesn’t combine with the other parent’s DNA either, so it reaches far back in time too.

Y-DNA and mitochondrial DNA tests are laser-focused on one line each, and only one line. You don’t have to try to sort it out of the ethnicity “pot,” wondering which ancestor was or was not Native.

My Recommendation

When putting together a testing strategy, I recommend taking advantage of free uploads and inexpensive unlocks when possible.

To confirm Native American ancestry via ethnicity testing, I recommend testing at 23andMe and uploading to FamilyTreeDNA, then purchasing the $19 unlock. The free upload and $19 unlock are less expensive than testing there directly.
For matching, I recommend testing at Ancestry and uploading to MyHeritage, then unlocking the MyHeritage advanced features for $29, which is less expensive than retesting. Ancestry does not provide segment information, but MyHeritage (and the others) do.

At this point, John will have taken two DNA tests, but is now in all four databases, plus GEDmatch if he uploads there.

For genealogy research on John’s lines to determine whether or not his mother’s lines were Native, I recommend an Ancestry and a MyHeritage records subscription, plus using WikiTree, which is free.
To determine if John’s mother’s direct matrilineal female line was Native, I recommend that John order the mitochondrial DNA test at FamilyTreeDNA.
When ordering multiple tests, or uploading at FamilyTreeDNA, be sure to upload/order all of one person’s tests on the same DNA kit so that those results can be used in combination with each other.

Both males and females can take autosomal and mitochondrial DNA tests.

To discover what he doesn’t know about his direct paternal, meaning John’s surname line – I recommend the Big Y-700 test at FamilyTreeDNA.

Only males can take a Y-DNA test, so women would need to ask their father, brother, or paternal uncle, for example, to test their direct paternal line.

If John can find a male Davis from his mother’s line, I recommend that he purchase the Big Y-700 test at FamilyTreeDNA for that person, or check to see if someone from his Davis line may have already tested by viewing the Davis DNA Project. Like with mitochondrial DNA, the Y-DNA haplogroup will tell John the origins of his direct Davis male ancestor – plus matching of course. He will be able to determine if they were Native, and if not, discover the origins of the Davis line.
For assigning segments to ancestors and triangulating to confirm descent from a common ancestor, I recommend 23andMe, MyHeritage, FamilyTreeDNA and GEDmatch, paired with DNAPainter as a tool.

Shopping and Research List

Here are the tests and links recommended above:

23andMe
Ancestry
MyHeritage Upload with free matching, then $29 unlock
FamilyTreeDNA Upload with free matching, then $19 unlock
GEDmatch free upload, then $9.95 monthly subscription for advanced tools if needed
FamilyTreeDNA mitochondrial DNA test (using the same kit number as the upload)
FamilyTreeDNA Big Y-700 for John and also for Davis male tester if he can find one
DNAPainter for uploading ethnicity painting plus segments that can be identified to specific ancestors to determine which ancestors provided which ethnicity segments
MyHeritage records subscription (free trial) (for genealogy research)
Ancestry subscription for genealogy research

More Than He Asked

I realize this answer is way more than John expected or even knew to ask. That’s because there is often no “one” or “one best” answer. There are many ways to approach the question after the goal is defined, and the first “answer” received may be a bit out of context.

For example, let’s say John has 2% Native ancestry and took a test at a vendor who didn’t detect it. John would believe he had none. But a different vendor might find that 2%. If it’s on his mother’s direct matrilineal line, mitochondrial DNA testing will confirm, or refute Native, beyond any doubt, regardless of autosomal ethnicity results – but only for that specific ancestral line.

Autosomal DNA can suggest Native across all your DNA, but Y-DNA and mitochondrial DNA confirm it for each individual ancestor.

Even when autosomal testing does NOT show Native American, or African, for example, it’s certainly possible that it’s just too far back in time or has not been passed down during random recombination, but either Y-DNA or mitochondrial DNA will unquestionably confirm (or refute) the ancestry in question if the right person is tested.

This is exactly why I attempt to find a cousin who descends appropriately from every ancestor and provide testing scholarships. It’s important to obtain Y-DNA and mitochondrial DNA information for each ancestor.

Which Test Should I Order?

What steps will help you decide which test or tests to take?

Define your testing goal.
Determine if your Y-DNA or mitochondrial DNA will help answer the question.
Determine if you need to find ancestors another generation or two back in time to get the most benefit from DNA testing. In our example, if John discovered that both of his grandparents were enrolled tribal members, that’s huge, and the tribe might have additional information about his family.
Subscribe to Ancestry and MyHeritage records collections as appropriate to perform genealogical research. Additional information not only provides context for your family, it also provides you with the ability to confirm or better understand your ethnicity results.
Extend your tree so that you can obtain the best results from the three vendors who support trees; Ancestry, FamilyTreeDNA, and MyHeritage. All three use trees combined with DNA tests to provide you with additional information.
Order 23andMe and Ancestry autosomal DNA tests.
Either test at or upload one of those tests to MyHeritage, FamilyTreeDNA, and GEDmatch.
If a male, order the Big Y-700 DNA test. Or, find a male from your ancestral line who has taken or will take that test. I always offer a testing scholarship and, of course, share the exciting results!
Order a mitochondrial DNA test for yourself and for appropriately descended family members to represent other ancestors. Remember that your father (and his siblings) all carry your paternal grandmother’s mitochondrial DNA. That’s often a good place to start after testing your own DNA.
If your parents or grandparents are alive, or aunts and uncles, test their autosomal DNA too. They are (at least) one generation closer to your ancestors than you are and will carry more of your ancestors’ DNA.
Your siblings will carry some of your ancestors’ DNA that you do not, so test them too if both of your parents aren’t available for testing.

Enjoy!!!

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DNA Purchases and Free Uploads

FamilyTreeDNA – Y, mitochondrial and autosomal DNA testing
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23andMe Ancestry – Autosomal DNA only, no Health
23andMe Ancestry Plus Health

Genealogy Products and Services

MyHeritage FREE Tree Builder – Genealogy software for your computer
MyHeritage Subscription with Free Trial
Legacy Family Tree Webinars – Genealogy and DNA classes, subscription-based, some free
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Newspapers.com – Search newspapers for your ancestors
NewspaperArchive – Search different newspapers for your ancestors

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DNA for Native American Genealogy – by Roberta Estes, for those ordering the e-book from anyplace, or paperback within the United States
DNA for Native American Genealogy – for those ordering the paperback outside the US

Genealogy Books

Genealogical.com – Lots of wonderful genealogy research books

Genealogy Research

Legacy Tree Genealogists – Professional genealogy research

DNA Testing the Recently Deceased

Posted on June 14, 2019 by Roberta Estes

No one really want to think about this, but it happens.

You’ve always meant to DNA test someone, and they’ve agreed, but either you didn’t order the kit, or the kit is far away from where they passed away.

What can you do?

Take heart, all is not lost. You have two options.

Swabbing the dead

Swabbing the Deceased

Some funeral homes work with companies for DNA preservation and other services, but these services do not provide you with genealogy results from any of the major vendors and are processed by the lab associated with the company whose kit the funeral home is selling.

For genealogy, you have two options.

Call Family Tree DNA (713-868-1438 9-5 CST) and have them overnight you a swab kit. The funeral director can swab the inside of their cheek and generally, funeral directors do a great job. You may want to ask for extra vials to be included in the overnight package, just in case. This is your last (and only) chance.
If you don’t have time or aren’t in a location where you can receive an overnight delivery, purchase an Identigene paternity test kit at any CVS or similar drugstore. That kit will cost you about $27 for the kit alone, but the kit contains sterile swabs and a sterile pouch for inserting the swabs after swabbing the inside of the cheek. DO NOT SEND THE SWABS TO IDENTIGENE. Instead, call Family Tree DNA and explain that you are sending the Identigene swabs to their lab for processing. They will provide you with instructions and you must obtain approval before sending non-standard swabs for processing.

Caveats and Alternatives

Cheek swabbing must occur before embalming because embalming fluid interferes with DNA processing, per Dr. Connie Bormans, lab director at GenebyGene.
Having said that, there are cases where swabbing has taken place after embalming and it did work. It doesn’t hurt anything to try. The worst that happens is that the test fails.
Per my friendly mortician, if you’re desperate and embalming has occurred, another area where some have achieved swabbing success is the crease behind the ear lobe where skin cells tend to become trapped if the body has not already been cleaned in that area. At this point, you have nothing to lose by trying.
Please note that sometimes “overnight” is not actually overnight. I attempted to overnight something across the Memorial Day weekend and “overnight” in that case was actually Friday to Tuesday for all carriers. If you are in a pickle, be aware of delivery constraints surrounding weekends, holidays and perhaps a very remote location.

Ordering

After the kit is returned to Family Tree DNA for processing, you can order the regular suite of tests. I would suggest that you order all the tests you actually want initially, because the quantity and/or quality of the DNA sample may be questionable.

In other words, later upgrades may not be successful. I had that situation occur with my aunt’s mitochondrial DNA test results. The initial mtPlus test was successful, but her sample could not be upgraded to either the mitochondrial full sequence or Family Finder.

Three Data Bases in One Test

While you can’t obtain a spit sample from a deceased person for other autosomal tests, you can transfer the person’s autosomal DNA results to both GedMatch and MyHeritage for additional matching after processing.

Hopefully you’ll never find yourself in this difficult situation, but if you do, you have options.

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Disclosure

I receive a small contribution when you click on some (but not all) of the links to vendors in my articles. This does NOT increase the price you pay but helps me to keep the lights on and this informational blog free for everyone. Please click on the links in the articles or to the vendors below if you are purchasing products or DNA testing.

Thank you so much.

DNA Purchases and Free Transfers

Genealogy Services

Genealogy Research

Legacy Tree Genealogists for genealogy research

Get Your Ducks in a Row – Time May Be Shorter Than You Think

Posted on November 4, 2015 by Roberta Estes

Helen Rutledge is my cousin. She and I have been sniffing around the same records in the same counties for many years now. I only wish we had met earlier so we could have shared more of the chase.

Helen is no “spring chicken” as we say on the farm. In fact, Helen has continued to research far into her golden years – being in her 90s now. Want to hear the great irony? Helen has no children to leave her work to – but this does not deter her. Helen is the aunt that every one of us wants to have in our family.

Recently Helen sent me an e-mail that both saddened me and inspired me, and with her permission, I’m sharing it with you. I have omitted some of the more personal portions.

After 13 days in the hospital I returned to long term nursing care. I brought my computer and genealogy records from Assisted Living to my new level of care. However, now instead of researching, I am organizing my research to leave for my nephew and some research archives. I have been forewarned in the most urgent way that there may not be time to think about how I will do this when the research is done. Well, we all know research is never finished.

Keep urging perseveration of research on your blog. It is as important as the research itself. Answers are no good if I am the only one who knows the answer to the puzzle…I must share it with others whether they give me credit or not. I thank you for alerting me to that truth and God for allowing me extended days to get my records in order as a gift to other researchers. Oh, the many little tidbits I have garnered, documented, and put together for those who follow in my footsteps with our family lineage.

Organization is not just entering our data into a genealogy program. It is documenting, making copies of the documents available when possible, and recording the ORDER of our research so those who are not familiar with the records, can follow the generations and become acquainted with their ancestors.

Be honest, say information is not documented, when such is the case, and challenge your readers to find documentation. Try to inspire descendants to fill in the blanks and record those who are yet unborn. While they will miss the thrill of solving the puzzle after years of frustration, they will know the joy of learning who they are.

Thank you, Helen, for your lovely, inspirational message. Sometimes we aren’t fortunate enough to receive a warning. (Note – Helen passed away in February, 2018.)

Another e-mail this week told of another cousin’s husband who died suddenly, with no warning, and he was 30 years younger than Helen.

DNA in Perpetuity

I would add one thing though, and that is to record your user names and passwords – especially relative to DNA accounts and tests and anyplace, like GedMatch, you have uploaded your results. Your DNA can never, and I repeat, NEVER, be replaced, while genealogy research could be with enough effort. Don’t let your DNA results become inaccessible.

At Family Tree DNA, you can designate a beneficiary.

On your personal page, under “Your Account” on the left hand side, select “Manage Personal Information.”

Then select Beneficiary Information and complete the form which includes your beneficiary’s name, e-mail and phone number. If you should pass away, this is who Family Tree DNA will allow to access your account. Other companies, to the best of my knowledge don’t include this information or provide this option, so you’ll need to be sure to leave your account access information available for your family members.

If you have not prepared for the inevitable, please take a few minutes to do so. You can make the DNA arrangements now, and easily.

Remember, at Ancestry, your DNA won’t be available unless your account (subscription and login) remains active, so you’ll need to take how to handle that into consideration.

You might want to download not just your raw data files, but matches as well when possible.

Public Sites

Upload your Y and mitochondrial DNA to sites like http://www.ysearch.org and http://www.mitosearch.org. Be sure to record the most distant ancestor and enough information to positively identify them, like birth and death dates, locations and spouse’s name. This is the only way to get your info into a public data base that is accessible without having DNA tested for a match. You can also enter Y and mito info at http://www.wikitree.com and attach it to the proper ancestor. This helps others in the future learn about their ancestors. Be sure to include your full haplogroup in the notes and a link to anything you may have published about that line.

Upload your autosomal results to http://www.gedmatch.com and upload trees where possible.

Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket, because baskets aren’t forever either. Think about how many genealogy companies have come and gone and what happened to our Y and mitochondrial DNA with both Ancestry and Sorenson (also destroyed by Ancesty).

Genealogy Research

You can take a few minutes to put together a plan for how to preserve and present the balance of your genealogy information. Preserving and publishing my genealogy research has been on my bucket list for some time now and is the purpose of the 52 Ancestors articles I’ve been writing for the past 18 months. I’ll write them until every ancestor is covered….or I can no longer write the articles – and I sincerely hope I have the opportunity to finish. Not just for my own sake, but for the benefit of everyone else who follows. I hope future researchers make huge breakthroughs and add immensely to what I know today. My work will at least give them a firm foundation to start from and they won’t have to replow the same ground.

One of the avenues to preserve your work online is a blog. WordPress offers free blogs and they will be available into perpetuity, whatever that really means. I am also printing my articles and will be donating them to archival facilities like the Allen County Public Library. And of course, I’ll have a set of binders for each of my children.

WikiTree is another public resource for your trees, your Y and mtDNA results and additional information, although that’s not the same as offering the detail in an article.

So, however you choose to do whatever you choose to do… just do it.

And do it now.

You may not have an opportunity later.

Time may be shorter than you think.

Get your ducks in a row.

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Lazarus – Putting Humpty Dumpty Back Together Again

Posted on January 14, 2015 by Roberta Estes

Recently, GedMatch introduced a tool, Lazarus, to figuratively raise the dead by combining the DNA of descendants, siblings and other relatives of long-dead ancestors to recreate their genome. Kind of like piecing Humpty Dumpty back together again.

Blaine Bettinger wrote about using Lazarus here and here where he recreated the genome of his grandmother. I’d like to use Lazarus to see how it works with one pair of siblings and a first cousin. Blaine was fortunate to have 4 siblings. I have a much smaller group of people to work with, so let’s see what we can do and how successful we are, or aren’t. But first, lets talk about the basics and how we can reconstruct an ancestor.

The Basics

An individual has 6766.2 cM of DNA. Both parents give half of their DNA to each child, but not exactly the same parental DNA is contributed to each child. A random process selects which half of the parents’ DNA is given to each child. Different children will have some of the same DNA from their parents, and some different DNA from each parent.

Obviously, the DNA contributed to each child from a parent is a combination of the DNA given to the parent by the grandparents. Approximately half of the grandparent’s DNA is given to each child. In many cases, the DNA contributed to the child from the grandparents is not actually divided evenly, and we receive all or nothing of individual segments, not half. Half is an average that works pretty well most of the time. It’s a statistic, and we all know about statistics…right???

Therefore, children carry 3383cM of each parent’s DNA. Each sibling carries half of the same DNA from their parents. From the ISOGG autosomal DNA statistics chart, each sibling actually carries 25% of exactly the same DNA from both parents, 50% where they inherited half of the same DNA from one parent and different DNA from the other parent, and 25% where the siblings don’t share any of the identical DNA from their parents. This averages 50%.

This chart, also from ISOGG, sums up what percentage of the same DNA different relatives can expect to carry.

Recreating Ferverda Brothers

I have a situation where I have a person, Barbara, and two of her first cousins, Cheryl and Don, who are siblings. This is the same family we discussed in the Just One Cousin article.

In this case, Cheryl and Don share 50% of Roscoe’s DNA.

Barbara shares 12.5% of Hiram and Evaline’s DNA with Cheryl and 12.5% with Don, but not the same 12.5%. Since siblings share 50% of their DNA, Barbara should share about 12.5% of Cheryl’s DNA and an additional 6.25% that the Cheryl didn’t receive from Roscoe, but that Don did.

Translating that into cMs, Barbara should share about 850 cM with Cheryl and an additional 425 cM with Don, for an approximate total of 1275 cM.

At http://www.gedmatch.com, I selected the Tier 1 (subscription or donation) option of Lazarus and was presented with this menu.

My first attempt was to recreate Barbara’s father, John W. Ferverda. I allowed 100 SNPs and 4cM because I was hoping to be able to accumulate more than the required 1500cM of matching DNA for the kit to be utilized as a “real kit,” available for one-to-many matching.

	100SNP 4cM	200SNP 4cM	300SNP 4cM	400SNP 4cM	500SNP 4cM	600SNP 4cM	700SNP 4cM
John W. Ferverda	1330.7 cM	1370.2 cM	1360.0 cM	1353.5 cM	1338.7 cM	1336.2 cM	1322.9 cM

I then experimented with the various SNP levels, leaving the cM at 4.

The resulting number of cM of just over 1300, no matter how you slice and dice it, is very near the expected approximation of 1275.

Using the Lazarus tool, I created “John Ferverda” by listing Barbara as his descendant and both Cheryl and Don as cousins.

To create “Roscoe Ferverda,” I reversed the positions of the individuals, listing Don and Cheryl as descendants and Barbara as the cousin.

These two created individuals, “John” and “Roscoe” should be exactly the same, and, thankfully, they were.

Both recreated “John” and “Roscoe” represent a common set of DNA from the parents of both of these men, Hiram Ferverda and Evaline Miller based on the matching DNA of their descendants, Barbara, Cheryl and Don.

The way Lazarus works is that all kits in Group 1, the descendants, are compared with Group 2, other relatives but not descendants. The descendants will carry some of Roscoe’s DNA, but also the DNA of Roscoe’s wife, the mother of Don and Cheryl. By comparing against known relatives but not direct descendants, Lazarus effectively narrows the DNA to that contributed only by the common ancestor of group 1 and group 2. In this case, that common ancestor would be John and Roscoe’s parents, Hiram Ferverda and Evaline Miller. By comparing the descendant and non-descendant-but-otherwise-related groups, you effectively subtract out the mother’s DNA from the descendants – in this case meaning the DNA of John Ferverda’s wife and Roscoe Ferverda’s wife.

In other words, the descendants, above, are NOT compared to each other, but instead, to each one of the not-descendant-but-otherwise-related group.

Unfortunately, none of the kits generated was over the 1500 cM threshold. I remembered that there is also a second cousin, Rex, whose DNA we can add because he descends from the parents of Evaline Miller.

Adding Rex to the mix brought the resulting “Roscoe” kit to 1589.7 cM and the resulting “John” kit to 1555.7 cM, both now barely over the 1500 threshold – but over just the same and that’s all that matters. Soon, we’ll be able to utilize both of these kits for direct matching as a “person” at GedMatch. Now how cool is that???

You receive four pieces of output information when you create a Lazarus kit.

First, a comparison between the descendants (Group 1 above, Kit 2 below) and each of the cousins and related-but-not-descendants individuals (Group 2 above, Kit 1 below), by chromosome.

John W. Ferverda

Processed: 2015/01/09 17:32:41
Name: John W. Ferverda
SNP threshold = 100 cM
Threshold = 4.0 cM
Batch processing will be performed if resulting kit achieves required threshold of 1500 cM.

Contributions:

Kit 1	Kit 2	Chr	Start	End	cM
F9141	M133930	1	72017	5703284	14.8
F9141	M133930	1	17271101	18589169	4.1
F9141	M133930	1	32804999	65722466	37.8
F9141	M133930	1	242601404	247174776	8.5

Obviously, these are only snippets of the output for chromosome 1. You receive a chart of this same information for all of the chromosomes of the people being compared.

Second, a chart that shows the resulting matching segments.

Resulting Segments:

Chr	Start	End	cM
1	742429	5694404	14.8
1	17285357	18588145	4.1
1	38226163	43823334	7.2
1	43975578	54990495	8.0
1	55040097	62847030	12.1
1	76341094	85237614	8.7
1	242606491	247179501	8.5

At the bottom of this second set of numbers is the all-important total cM. This is the only place you will find this number

Total cM: 1555.7

Third, a list of the original kits that have match results between the two groups.

Original Kits match with result:

Kit	Chr	Start	End	cM
F9141	1	742429	5700507	14.8
F9141	1	10899689	12530765	4.5
F9141	1	35075204	65714854	35.3
F9141	1	76334120	85252045	8.7
F9141	1	242606379	247169190	8.5
M133930	1	742429	5705356	14.8
M133930	1	35075956	65714854	35.3
M133930	1	242606491	247165725	8.5
F50000	1	10899689	12530765	4.5
F153785	1	742584	5700507	14.8
F153785	1	76337055	85252045	8.7
F153785	1	242606379	247169190	8.5

And finally, a summary.

196074 single allele SNPs were derived for the resulting kit.
37068 bi-allelic SNPs were derived for the resulting kit.
233142 total SNPs were derived for the resulting kit.
Kit number of Result: LX056148
Kit Name: John Ferverda 8
Your Lazarus file has been generated.

Is this as good as the real McCoy, meaning swabbing John and Roscoe? Of course not, but John and Roscoe aren’t available for swabbing. In fact, John and Roscoe are both probably finding this pretty amusing from someplace on the other side, watching their children “recreate” them!

I can hear them now, shaking their heads, “Well I never….”

They should have known if they left Cheryl and me here, together, unsupervised that we would do something like this!!!

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What If You Die?

Posted on January 28, 2014 by Roberta Estes

Well, it’s not exactly a what-if question, it’s a given. You’re going to. The only real question is when, and will you be prepared?

By prepared, I’m not talking about your will, I’m talking about your DNA.

The unspeakable happened this past weekend. A long time researcher and close friend, Aleda, died, rather unexpectedly. She has been chronically ill for some time, but not critically. On Saturday, she read my blog and worked with her research group on the Autosomal DNA Segment Analyzer. Then, in the afternoon, she said she didn’t feel well and got into her chair to take a nap. Nothing unusual about that. Aleda didn’t feel well a lot, but she persevered anyway, always helping and guiding her research group. But this time was different. Aleda was gone.

Her research group is wandering around like a group of lost souls. It’s like someone shot a hole through the middle of all of us. This isn’t a large well organized group with an official structure, but a small group of closely and not so closely related researchers trying to figure out their DNA and genealogy connections.

If you are a significant contributor, you will be sorely missed. If you are reading this, and have had your DNA tested, you are one of the contributors.

The research group members are already asking, “What next? How do we access the DNA records of the people Aleda had tested?” Good question. Let’s talk about preparing for the inevitable.

Aleda had given the kit passwords to a friend, who is now so upset she can’t find them. As the project administrator of one of the projects that includes one of Aleda’s family member’s kits, I can see some of the information.

E-Mail

I can see that Aleda set up a special DNA e-mail address which I’m presuming she used for all of the kits. Unfortunately, there is no alternate e-mail address.

When Family Tree DNA, and virtually all the companies, do a password reset, they send the password information to the e-mail address on file.

Does anyone, other than Aleda, have the password to that e-mail account?

Project administrators cannot change primary e-mail addresses. Only the kit owner can do that.

If you change your password to your e-mail account, you’ll need to remember to provide the new password to your trusted other as well.

Passwords

If you share your password with someone, that’s fine, but if they can’t find it, or if you change it and don’t tell them, that won’t be helpful. You might want to add their e-mail as an alternate. You might want to provide this information to multiple people, just in case your chosen person predeceases you, or some other unfortunate situation exists, like a fire, system crash or losing the passwords.

At 23andMe, to download a raw data file, a password isn’t enough. You also have to know the answer to the secret question.

Beneficiary Information

Family Tree DNA goes one step further and provides people with a beneficiary form for situations just like this.

Unfortunately, Aleda’s family member’s form is blank, and she protected his information by changing the setting to prevent project administrators from completing this form.

Covering all the Bases

Don’t forget about 3^rd party sites like GedMatch where you may also be registered.

What to do?

1. Family Tree DNA is the only company to provide the option of beneficiary information. Take advantage of this and complete the form. It’s only 3 lines – name, phone and e-mail of your beneficiary. You can find it under the “My Account” tab on the blue/black bar at the top of your personal page.

2. Add an alternate e-mail address.

3. Provide password and e-mail password information to a trusted other, and maybe a few trusted others.

4. Remember to notify password holders when you change passwords to either e-mail or DNA kits.

5. If you are a project administrator, try your best to find a co-administrator and share information, such as genealogy provided by participants.

6. Provide a notification list for your family that includes important genealogy and DNA contacts, including Family Tree DNA if you are a project administrator. Many times I’ve received an e-mail from someone’s account with their name as the subject. I’ve learned to cringe when I see them, because I know what’s coming…but at least the family has taken the trouble to notify those of us who communicate electronically with that person instead of leaving us to wonder forever what happened.

7. Preparing for the inevitable doesn’t just apply to DNA testing, but to all aspects of online life. Think about Facebook, for example. My brother died 2 years ago, today, and no one has his password. We post to his page from time to time, but like a ghost ship, his Facebook account will sail off into the indefinite captainless future.

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Picture This

Posted on May 21, 2013 by Roberta Estes

Margaret Herrell, what did you look like?

Margaret died in 1892, but we don’t have a photo of her nor of her second husband Joseph Preston Bolton who died in 1887. Her son, my great-grandfather, Joseph “Dode” Bolton died in 1920 and we don’t have a picture of him either, or his wife, Margaret Claxton/Clarkson who died just days later in the flu epidemic. The closest I can get is this photo of Margaret Herrell’s daughter.

Pleasant Smith and Surelda Martin (1836-1890) – daughter of my ancestor Margaret Herrell with her first husband, Anson Cook Martin – Hancock County, Tennessee.

Today, there was an article in “abroad in the yard” by Lee Rimmer that discussed an academic paper published in PLOS Genetics this week by Liu et al titled “A Genome-Wide Association Study Identifies 5 Loci Influencing Facial Morphology in Europeans.”

We all know that facial characteristics are genetic. Identical twins look more alike that fraternal twins, and fraternal twins look more alike that cousins or half-siblings. But exactly which genes contribute to that structural composition of faces is unknown, or has been until now. This recent paper identifies 5 genes that influence to some extent the morphology of the face by identifying specific facial landmarks and the genes that influence them. Researchers expect to find hundreds or thousands more, but many of these may play small roles.

Already people are talking about forensic applications where from a drop of blood, a hair, spit or other body fluids or tissues, one could sequence the DNA, then create a 3D profile or image of the perpetrator of the crime. Indeed, that is the holy grail of forensic genetics.

And yes, it’s a long way in the future. However, the very definition of “long way” is certainly open to debate. We’ve covered genetic ground in the past decade alone that we never thought possible.

This (future) application has other possibilities for genealogists. We already know how to phase data, to attribute it to one parent or the other. Using those and other comparative and triangulation tools, we also know how to determine genetic sequences that we share inherited from specific ancestors. In fact, once that genetic segment is identified as inherited from a particular ancestral line, might it be possible in the future to indeed, reassemble enough of the DNA of that ancestor (by knowing the genes involved and the descendants who carry those genes today) to create an image of that long dead ancestor?

Maybe one day, not terribly far in the future, we’ll be able to submit a list of segments of DNA to a special processing “studio” online, that will in return provide us with what our ancestor looked like, long before the advent of cameras when only the images of royalty were preserved. And maybe, just maybe, if you tell them the place and time your ancestor was born, and his or her occupation, if you know, you’ll also receive the “photo” of your ancestor dressed in period clothes and hairstyle.

And while it might not be exact, just like this “cleaned up” photo isn’t exact from an original, shown below, it’s most assuredly better than nothing – and in that image we can certainly see something very similar to our ancestor – and in them we can see ourselves.

Let’s hope that this big genealogical dream of what today seems impossible happens in our lifetime so that we can complete our family tree by recreating images of ancestors from long ago. Indeed, how much closer could one feel to an ancestor than to have their image resurrected by the DNA, their DNA, carried by their descendants. And what an incredible crowdsourcing project – it may take a virtual genealogical village.

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Swabbing the (Recently) Deceased

Posted on April 14, 2013 by Roberta Estes

Meet Ezekiel Estes, son of Susanna Estes and ? Ezekiel was born in 1814 in Halifax County, Virginia, and died in 1885, not terribly long after the camera was invented. That is clearly when this photo was taken, at his death.

His great-grandchildren didn’t know that his father was ? The family rumor had always been that Susanna, his mother, was apparently married to an Estes cousin, which explained why her surname as a “widow” was the same as her maiden name. However, a lot of courthouse records research, reading of old depositions that still exist and DNA testing of a descendant proved that indeed, Ezekiel’s father was not an Estes man.

How many of you have a photo like this, or maybe one even better, with the casket showing? Believe it or not, people made postcards of these kinds of photos. In the early 1900s, there were photos of children who had died that were dressed and posed with the parents, as if they were still alive. Can’t make it to the funeral, don’t worry…you get a picture.

But back then, once someone was dead, they were, well, dead forever… gone, except for that one photo. Today, that’s not quite the case, because one can preserve DNA and part of that person will live forever through the information their DNA provides. I mean, if we had Ezekiel’s actual DNA, we might be able to figure out who his father was.

So, what do you do if you meant to have Aunt Gladys swab at the family reunion this summer, but she had the bad judgment to pass away at Memorial Day? Don’t just throw up your hands and show up at the funeral empty handed. The funeral director is your friend. They do a fine job of cheek swabbing.

Call Family Tree DNA (on the phone, not e-mail), tell the customer service representative the situation and ask for a kit to be overnighted to either the funeral director or a family member who can be counted on to take it to the funeral director the same day. The funeral director will swab the cheek of the dearly departed and you will indeed still have the DNA information that Aunt Gladys meant to give you at the reunion. Indeed, it’s a wonderful last gift and legacy for her to leave for you and the rest of her family and descendants.

Yes, and I know the next question that’s coming. What about digging up the dead or testing things left behind? Well, you’ll have to wait for a future article to discuss that in detail. It’s much easier and infinitely less expensive to get a swab kit to the funeral director, let’s put it that way. Plus, you’re pretty much guaranteed to get DNA from a cheek swab and attempting to retrieve DNA from personal items later is less than 50% successful, best case, and sometimes much less. So, enlist the help of the funeral director, call Family Tree DNA or keep a swab kit handy at home at all times!

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