Help me understand DNA testing

[Phogfan86]

In another thread, someone mentioned DNA testing as a reliable way of learning about one's ancestry. They provided a link to a website that advertised DNA testing. I've always been curious and have thought about having DNA testing done, but I need to have someone explain it to me like I'm 6.

Here's what the website said:

Y-DNA - Universal Male Test, starting at $119. Males can test their Y-DNA to determine the origin of their paternal line. Note that the Y-DNA test strictly checks the paternal line, with no influence from any females along that line. Females do not receive Y-DNA, and therefore females cannot be tested for the paternal line. If you are a female and would like to know about your paternal line, you would need to have a brother or a male relative from that line tested.

Keeping in mind, I'm a male, again, talk to me like I'm 6. What exactly does this mean?

[long_hand]

Men have the XY chromosome mix and women have the XX chromosome mix. The Y chromosome is genetically distinct and only passed from father to son.

[dfmacliam]

Y-DNA - Universal Male Test, starting at $119. Males can test their Y-DNA to determine the origin of their paternal line.
this is the line passed from father to son.. your paternal lineage

Note that the Y-DNA test strictly checks the paternal line, with no influence from any females along that line.
it will only show the male lineage.. no female lineage will be present

Females do not receive Y-DNA, and therefore females cannot be tested for the paternal line.
a woman cannot be tested for a male lineage.. as her fathers lineage

If you are a female and would like to know about your paternal line, you would need to have a brother or a male relative from that line tested.
if a woman wants to find out her male lineage.. she will have to get a brother/ father/cousin/ uncle to take the test... its probably best to have the closest male relative test..

A side note.. a woman can test her female lineage... refered to as the maternal lineage, but a man can test both his paternal and his maternal lineage... but they must be two seperate tests.... so if you pay $119.00 for the paternal test.. you will probably the same for the maternal test.. or sometimes they have deals where you pay less for doing both tests..

[Oldhiker]

main thing to remember is this only test your fathers line. It is a tool you can use to help focus your paper trail search or confirm your paper trail. it does not take a curved route through your total genome base.

[ForresterModern]

Doctor in the house. Doctor hat on.

The Y chromosome, as stated above, is only present in males (with rare exceptions) and is passed directly from one's father to the son, generation after generation. Since names in the western european model present in england and scotland also passed the paternal surname from father to son (at least for the last few centuries), the name would follow the Y chromosome.

The Y chromosome is actually this pitifully small thing, with very limited genetic material included in small packets called genes, each gene with its own individual purpose. The chromosomes are made up of deoxyribonucleic acids (or DNA), which itself is made up of 4 chemicals known as nucleotides(cytosine-C, thymine-T, Guanine-G, and adenine-A) which are chemically strung together in a long linear strand. DNA is made up of two complimentary strands, as certain nucleotides mate up with certain other nucleotides across from one strand to the other. Certain sections of each DNA strand/chromosome code for specific protein manufacture which ends up causing a specific end effect like blue eyes or blond hair, when combined with the protein effects of the other matching chromosome (we have pairs of 22 different chromosomes plus either an XY mismatched pair in males or XX matched pair in females). Each gene also may have minor variations in its chemical makeup---for example a certain sequence of ACTG nucleotides in a certain location in a certain gene on a certain chromosome may code for blue eyes while a different sequence of nucleotides in the same place in the same gene on another similar chromosome would code for maybe green eyes. Since most chromosomes have nearly identical mates (pairs of same numbered chromosomes) the genes do battle to see what the eventual expression of those different genes will be (dominant, recessive, or codominance--in my example green (dominant) wins out over blue(recessive) and the individual will have green eyes).

Since the Y chromosome has little genetic material to match up with the much bigger X chromosome many x-related genes express the mother's contribution in outward appearence simply because there is not mate to contend with on the smaller Y. However the Y chromosome does still carry a significant number of genes which can be traced by biochemical tests, and those individual variations in nucleotide group ordering in those genes can be identified (variations similar to the blue eye-green eye discussion above) by the DNA testing everyone is talking about. Y chromosome genes rarely mutate spontaneously so they are a good marker to follow from one generation to the next, and so forth, in the paternal line. Multiple diferent variations for each geen exist, and multiple different genes can be tested and typed as to which variation is present in each gene. Males of similar lineage should have similar Y DNA chromosomal genetic markers, regardless of how many generations apart they might be.

So, for instance, 20 different males with the last name Macdonald all get DNA tested in Scotland, and we find that 4 of them have identical Y genetic profiles. We can say that they all descend from a common ancestor while the others do not descend from THAT ancestor, despite the MacDonald name. You may be an american MacDonald and get your DNA tested and it matches those four other MacDonalds, at some time in the past one of your paternal lineage was a MacDonald, and you share a common lineage with those other four MacDonalds, i.e., you are paternally related. Same thing even if your name is not now MacDonald---maybe you were a Macdonald who segregated into a sept subsequently taking the sept name instead of the paternally inherited name, maybe you or someone in your paternal lineage were adopted yielding a name change, maybe there was some illegitimacy in your past and a paternal line was started using your mother's name. Your Y chromosome genetic marker makeup will tell your paternal heritage as long as you have something to compare it to (the huge Y chromosome DNA database). The more genetic markers tested the more acurrate the matings are, so if you are really going to do it to try to trace ancestry backward into the "old country", wherever that may be, try to do as many markers as you can afford or are available at the time you do the test. More markers are being defined every month and the number of testable genes is increasing regularly (more than a hundred now I believe).

Doctor hat off. I have not been tested yet, but will be in the next couple years, once I narrow down my american ancestry back to the first Foster/Forrester who came to the US. Also waiting for the number of testable markers to go up, and hopefully the price to go down. This will help me find direct line descendants back in the old country, and hopefully some distant relatives, maybe even royalty (there is alledgedly at least one
knighted member of my lineage).


jeff

[Galician]

Academic in the house. Academic cap on. I don't to dash your hopes, or let you risk embarassment, when you drop in for a cup of sugar at the neighboring castle BUT a knight would be considered aristocracy, as opposed to royalty, which is strictly the king's family.

[Pleater]

There are always going to be people with surnames and genetics that don't match - so even if it is possible to trace a family line on paper, the genetic results will sometimes be a surprise.

It has been known for samples to get switched at laboratories, babies to be switched in hospitals, and all sorts of other odd occurrences.

Anne the Pleater :ootd:

[ForresterModern]

Academic in the house. Academic cap on. I don't to dash your hopes, or let you risk embarassment, when you drop in for a cup of sugar at the neighboring castle BUT a knight would be considered aristocracy, as opposed to royalty, which is strictly the king's family.

Galician

Although the connection is loose, according to family historians :

"BALDWIN III, of Flanders, the Forester, ‘of the handsome beard’, who married the daughter of the Count of Luxemburg. This Forester was a great warrior and defended his Kingdom against the united forces of Emperour Henry, King Robert of France and the Duke of Normandy. He died in 1034 and was succeeded by his son:

6. BALDWIN IV, the Forester, called ‘LeDebonair’, who married Princess Adela, daughter of Robert, King of France. They had four children:

7. i. Baldwin V, the Forester

8. ii. Robert Forester, who conquered the Principality, Frisland.

9. iii. Matilda (or Maud) who married William the Conqueror.

10. iv. Sir Richard Forester, (sometimes Latinized, Ricardus Forestarius.)

10. SIR RICHARD FORESTER, mentioned above as the first to naturally bear the name, was head of the powerful Northumberland family of Foresters. "



Sir Richard Forrester was brother in law to William the Conqueror and reportedly his right hand lieutenant in William's conquest which extended north to about the Firth of Forth. Interestingly Corstorphine, parts of the Stirling region, and Northumberland were in some fashion seats of power for the Forrester clan from then on, with a disproportionate distribution of Forresters/Forsters/Fosters represented there in old and recent census data.

If you note more than one "Forrester" married royalty (Baldwin III to the daughter of the Count of Luxembourg, his son Baldwin IV to the daughter of the king of France, and their daughter Matilda to William the Conqueror). There are supposedly several other reports of male branches of the Forrester line marrying into various branches of a couple of the other historically royal bloodlines:

"18. SIR REGINALD who fought at Bannockburn in 1314. A number of his descendants were great chieftains, many being knighted, and were closely related to the Royal Families of England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. "

As I said above I am still verifying the american lineage to the English/Scottish lineage, but feel confidant that I am only a year or less away from completing that task. DNA may be the final arbiter one way or the other, however. The knight to which I originally referred was a Sir Richard Forster who allegedly came to america in the early 1600's, landed and was "landed" in Virginia and begat the vast majority of the Forster/Foster families and descendants of those families that originated out of Virginia, one of which we believe to be mine. I am only a couple generations away from making my connection to the Old Country through Sir Richard (lineage verified back to the mid-late 1600's in the appropriate counties in Virginia).



We now return to your regulalry schedule broadcast.

[skauwt]

In another thread, someone mentioned DNA testing as a reliable way of learning about one's ancestry. They provided a link to a website that advertised DNA testing. I've always been curious and have thought about having DNA testing done, but I need to have someone explain it to me like I'm 6.

Here's what the website said:

Y-DNA - Universal Male Test, starting at $119. Males can test their Y-DNA to determine the origin of their paternal line. Note that the Y-DNA test strictly checks the paternal line, with no influence from any females along that line. Females do not receive Y-DNA, and therefore females cannot be tested for the paternal line. If you are a female and would like to know about your paternal line, you would need to have a brother or a male relative from that line tested.

Keeping in mind, I'm a male, again, talk to me like I'm 6. What exactly does this mean?

i got mine done a few months ago and have just the past week got all my final results in from my ydna and mtdna test and like yourself i hadn't a clue what was what about DNA data
these past few months Ive searched umpteen sites to learn work out a basic idea of time scope the test shows

i recommend if you can that you do it in conjunction with a clan group for example i did the test with the Chisholm clan group being a Chisholm i felt it was helpful for others also your not only helping find out info about yourself your doing that bit for other clansmen around the world that may be stuck when it comes to the paper trail on a family tree

the results you`ll get depends on what test you do the mtdna told me i descended from a women born about 25000 and 30000 years ago and i know her offspring spread through Europe (Spain ,Portugal) and eventually to Ireland which in fact where i can trace my great great great grandmother on my Gran's side to so i know my mothers maternal side has a wee story to how she got here in Scotland granted i`ll never know the 100s of generations but i get a sense of how people move over time

my male side links me with Britain/NW Europe
my male side had during the ice age lived in whats now the north sea,Denmark and south of Britain France and so on as the ice moved north the people went north too all the ice melt over time flooded land called doggerland which is now the north sea
splitting the UK and Ireland from mainland Europe granted these displaced people eventually split in Celts /beaker people and so on

after time these folk started showing different DNA groups folk have moved back and forth in time but the DNA test will show you for example if your ancestors are from the viking regions or perhaps like mine mightve been in the UK region for a lot longer than the viking era there are even a few chisholms that descend from men trapped here with the sinking of spanish armada boats so it goes to show the results could be anything

you might not be getting what you expected in all truth from the results but its the tracing of story of how your ancestors moved about and how you got to where you are
that for me was the whole point of the dna test it doesnt matter if your connected to a royal or a nobelmen at the end of the day where all people from the same folk

[O'Callaghan]

Doctor in the house. Doctor hat on.

The Y chromosome, as stated above, is only present in males (with rare exceptions) ... <SNIP>

jeff

I defer to you as the doc, but AFAIK, those women who do have a Y chromosome are not able to pass it on, as they are not fertile. That is a complicated subject in it's own right.