DNAme - How My Son is Related to John Adams, Emperor Nicholas II of Russia, and Cheddar Man

Early last summer, I received an email from Dan Manley, who works for a UK-based DNA testing firm, asking me if I would like to receive a free test kit and write about the results of the DNA test on my blog. I agreed to do so, but I explained to Manley that I would like to have a family member tested instead, since I had already been tested by two other companies. With this understanding in place, I chose to have one of my adult sons participate. Surprisingly, my son eagerly submitted the necessary cheek swabs when I received the free test kit. 

DNAme, it seems, is a fairly new company. The following is an excerpt from the company's website:

"Just like footprints on wet sand, the journey of our ancestors to populate the world left trails within us.  These trails are carried in all of our cells and laid within our genes. We offer you a way to analyse your DNA and to find out the journey of your ancestors from Africa, 150,000 years ago, up to the present time...."

Although the company itself is based in the UK, my son's DNA sample was processed in the U.S. in a lab in Virginia. The test kit looked very much like those used by other genetic DNA testing companies. The swabs, shaped like mini-toothbrushes, were sealed inside plastic tubes with what appeared to be "twist-off" tops. These "tops" turned out to be rather difficult to "twist" off, however, and I actually damaged one tube container so much that I used heavy duty tape to re-seal the tube. My son and I were each concerned that this particular sample would be contaminated. So I emailed Manley before we mailed the tubes to the lab and explained what had happened, and he seemed surprised by the apparent difficulty and possible defect. But he assured me the difficulty I encountered opening and resealing the tubes was not an everyday occurrence, and he felt certain the sample should arrive intact at the lab. So we dropped the return kit in the U. S. mail and hoped for the best.

We waited several weeks with no confirmation of receipt by email from the lab or from the company, so I sent an email off to Manley. He quickly responded that the test had indeed reached the lab. It seemed as if it took much longer to receive test results from DNAme than what I anticipated, since the longest period of time I had waited for a previous test with another company (U.S. based) was about four weeks. 

Several weeks after the follow-up email with Manley, I received notification in the mail that DNAme test results were in and were available on the company's website, www.DNAme.co. A small cardboard "ID" type card, containing an access code for viewing the results, was included with the letter. Retrieval of the results was quick and simple, and the website allowed us to download a copy of the report in .pdf format to save for future reference. My son's test results were clear and concise. The document stated his Y-Chromosome markers were analyzed, and his paternal haplotype was identified as R1b. The R1b Haplogroup carries the mutation M343. According to an explanation contained on the first page of the report of findings is this information:

"Haplogroup R is thought to have appeared some 30,000 years ago in Central Asia and is widely spread all over the world. You carry the mutation M343 which is linked to one of the subclades of Haplogroup R called R1b which is thought to have been part of the recolonisation of Europe following the Last Glacial Maximum. The founding member of your tribe is thought to have been born in south west Asia approximately 15,000 - 20,000 years ago. That time was called the Late Glacial Maximum and the climate was very hostile. The whole world was populated by less than 500,000 inhabitants. During this period, Northern Europe was covered with ice and approximely 100 metres below the modern-day one......It has also been suggested that most European male lineages descended from Near Eastern farmers and that maternal lineages descended from hunter-gatherers. This finding suggests that there has been a reproductive advantage for male farmers over hunter-gathers during the Paleolithic to the Neolithic transition period."

My son especially focused in on the next statement:

"You belong to direct descendants of the Cro Magnon people, the modern humans who painted the "Lascaux Cave" in Dordogne in the South of France. These paintings can be regarded both as a testimony of the artistic skills of your ancestors but also as a sketch book of their life during the last glacial age." What is interesting is that he does have some undeveloped artistic skills....now we know his skills are contained in his DNA.

At this point in reading the findings of his Y-Chromosome testing, my son was ready for some simply stated results....actually, so was I. So this is the text that followed, although it is still somewhat complex:

"The journey of your ancestors started about 60,000 years ago in Africa close to the Rift Valley region. Following the herds, they migrated toward the north. At that time, the Sahara was not a desert but a hospitable area.  Following a climate shift, they continued moving toward the north-east and left Africa via the Arabian Peninsula. They did not stay there but followed the coastline and finally reached Central Asia. It was some 40,000 years ago that one of your ancestors migrated towards the west of Europe while the rest of the tribe decided to aim towards India and Asia. The climate changed again and glaciers started to cover Europe. Your ancestors met the Neanderthals, but probably due to their communicating and tool building skills had an advantage over them.  With the climate continuing to become harsher, your ancestors looked for refuges in the southern parts of Europe. Following the Late Glacial Maximum and the thawing of the ice, your ancestors populated and dominated the northern parts of Europe. At that time, the English Channel was mostly dry and could be crossed on foot."

Now just what does Haplogroup R1b mean for my son?

The report explains this particular Haplogroup in the following paragraph:

"The R Haplogroup and its subclades, R1a, R1b and R2 are widely spread all over the world. R1b can be found in more than 80% of the population in England, France and Spain. In western Ireland, R1b is found in nearly 100% of the population.  It is also greatly found in the United States and in some parts of Africa like Cameroon. The more we move towards central and eastern Europe the more Haplogroup R1a is represented. R2 is mostly found in India."

In summary, my son's genetic ancestry is:

European (England, France, and Spain)                                    95.40%
American (refers to non-specified Native American ancestry)      3.70%
African                                                                                           0.20%
Asian                                                                                             0.70%   
                                                              Total:                           100.00%                                                                          

DNAme notes on the report the test's accuracy as + or - .5%

One finding reported by DNAme was surprising. It states that his matrilineal DNA Haplogroup is "U." This is an unusual reporting result in most genetic DNA testing of Y-Chromosomes. What I now know is that my son's maternal line, including me, according to the test results, is "part of a very large and old Haplogroup, the U group, which gave rise to a large part of the European population. (The) initial ancestor is thought to have been born in western Asia some 50,000 to 55,000 years ago during the Ice Age, about 15,000 years after modern humans started to spread from Africa. At that time, the first humans had just left their home from where we all originate. (My son's) great-great-grandmother probably came via the Middle East and crossed the Caucasus Mountains to explore new lands....Asia and Europe."

Wow, what a long and rich history we have as a people, always on the move, and it hasn't ended yet......

And yes, my son is related to John Adams, Emperor Nicholas II of Russia, and shares a common ancestor with Cheddar Man, who lived more than 9,000 years ago. According to DNAme, "Cheddar Man" lived more than 9,000 years ago and is regarded as Britain's oldest skeleton. DNA testing, also according to DNAme's report, describes how DNA testing permitted the discovery of two living descendants of the Cheddar Man still living in the town of Somerset, England, close to where his remains were found.  

The story of "Cheddar Man" and where his skeleton was found is quite interesting, especially since my son's paternal ancestry can be traced back to Somerset, England in the 1600's.  

Thanks, Dan Manley, for the free test kit, with the only obligation that I write about the results!

Y-DNA Testing - Halotype Results and Unanswered Questions

Well, the DNA testing results are in.  Actually, the results have been available since late December, but I am just now getting around to writing about what the findings.  The test kit itself was uncomplicated, but the results were delayed twice.  The delays were good, though, since each one represented the lab's dedicated efforts to ensure reliable results.  If I may backtrack for a moment here, DNA testing seemed to be the last resort for me in determining the name of my fourth paternal grandfather, Samuel Porter's father. There were too many Porter men in South Carolina and in Mississippi during the late 1700s and early 1800s to make a definitive match.  So, I joined  the World Family Tree's Porter Surname Project and enlisted the help of a Porter male family member in providing a cheek swab sample for a Y-DNA test.  I chose the test that would yield 37 markers and provide halotype information. If you are unfamiliar with genealogical DNA testing and are wondering what is a "marker" and why one would be interested in 37 (and testing more more than 37 is available), an explanation can be found here.  Now if you are also wanting to know what "halotype" means and why this information is important to genealogical DNA research, an explanation is provided here. 

The individual who provided the DNA sample for my Porter research was a first cousin, twice removed, and the only living male child or grandchild of my paternal great-grandfather, John James Porter, his father, James M. Porter, and his father, Samuel Porter.  Samuel Porter was born circa 1799 in South Carolina and came to the Mississippi Territory in the early 1800s.  In early 1825, Samuel Porter married Mary Middleton in Franklin County, Mississippi, before moving a few years later to Madison and Attala Counties after the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek opened up land there in 1832.  According to a copy of their marriage certificate, parents' names for neither Samuel nor Mary appear on the document. Although DNA testing has determined that my Samuel Porter is related to John Porter, who lived in the early 1600s in Virginia and to his descendants, Edward Sanders Porter, Elisha Jeter Porter, Hancock Porter, and Stark(s) Porter, I still do not know the name of Samuel's father. There were other male Porter family members living in Franklin County, Mississippi in the early 1800s, including John, Landlot, and James, but I have been unable to find Samuel's direct connection to any of these three men. 

Although Y-DNA testing did not yield the initial results I sought, it did produce a finding that confirms some questions about my paternal grandmother's family that I have had since I was very young.  My father's male family members share the J1 Halotype, indicating they have ancestry that links them to countries in and around the Fertile Crescent . My questions began when I was a young student studying geography and history.  Wanting to know where my own family originated, I asked my grandmother about her heritage and her family's origins.  I remember her reply when she said that "Mama's people were Black Dutch and Papa's people were Moors from South Carolina."  As I grew older, I often recalled her words and wanted to know more about her Porter family's heritage.  There was something unusual about these male Porter family members - besides the fact that most of them were quite tall, they exhibited very distinct facial features, and their skin color was what some might call "swarthy."  When I was older, I wondered even more about the Porter family's ethnicity, as I compared the looks of my own father, and my brothers as they grew older, to his mother's relatives. As I matured and learned more about various cultural, religious, and ethnic traditions, I often wondered if my grandmother's insistence that my siblings and I not drink milk when we ate fish might indicate that we had a Jewish ancestry. Now, thanks to Y-DNA testing results that show a J1 Halotype finding, my questions have been answered. 

For more information about Halotypes, including the J1 Halotype, read here.

Genealogy and DNA Testing

DNA testing is one of many tools in the family researcher's toolbox today, and it is absolutely a hot topic of conversation within the genealogy community. Thanks to a plethora of crime shows on television, most of us know how DNA works.  But genealogy testing goes beyond what is done on tissue and body fluid samples during a crime scene investigation. DNA results obtained from one tiny cheek swab can assist a researcher in finding a connection to an individual's ancestor as well as the part of the world in which the family originated.  Sounds so easy, doesn't it?  Although the test itself is a simple one, the results are much more complicated.  More about DNA testing, the process and the results, can be found here. Several months ago, after searching for years for some of my own paternal ancestors, I decided to join one of the surname projects sponsored by WorldFamilies.net.  Watch here for more posts that chronicle a quest for the name of a paternal ancestor that began with a simple cheek swab sample from a male relative and the Y-DNA results from a lab in Houston, Texas.