Just got an exciting email from a niece. She reports that she has taken the AncestryDNA test!
Her results:
Europe 100%
- Europe West 46%
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Finland/Northwest Russia 34%
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Ireland 10%
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Great Britain 8%
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Trace Regions 2%
At a quick glance, this squares up with what I would expect. She has great grandparents on her mother’s side (my sister) who emigrated from Finland, at the beginning of the 20th century, which accounts for the percentage from Finland. In addition, on her mother’s mother’s side, she also has Colonial and early 19th century ancestry from England, Scotland (Scots Irish) and Ireland, plus a couple family lines from Germany. Although I’m not as familiar with her father’s lineage, I’m pretty sure that it contributes to the Europe West component of her DNA.
I looked quickly at the information provided by Ancestry.com on AncestryDNA. Here is what it says:
Why AncestryDNA
AncestryDNA is new and more comprehensive
Autosomal DNA
AncestryDNA looks at autosomal DNA. Autosomal DNA tests, unlike Y- or mtDNA tests, survey a person’s entire genome at over 700,000 locations where genetic markers that identify an individual typically appear. Plus, autosomal DNA tests look at both maternal and paternal lines, meaning discoveries come from both sides of your family tree.
A DNA test for both men and women
AncestryDNA is gender neutral, so both men and women can take the test. They are tested in the same way for the same number of markers, and their tests provide the same level of detail.
The power of Ancestry.com
Consider the millions of family trees on Ancestry.com. How valuable would it be to link to those trees via DNA? You’d be able to determine genetic connections and uncover new family lines, deep relationships, and insights like you never have before. AncestryDNA helps you do all that. And more.
The limitations of older tests
Previously, DNA tests looked at only a few dozen DNA sequences on either the Y chromosome or mitochondrial DNA. Because only men carry the Y chromosome, only men could take a Y-DNA test. As a result, Y-DNA test results would follow just the males in a single paternal line — fathers and sons.
Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) tests, on the other hand, could be taken by anyone. But the test results traced only an all-female line moving from mother to grandmother to great-grandmother, and so on. MtDNA tests could tell you more about your ancient ancestry, like where your family originated tens of thousands of years ago, but not who your cousins were.
A few years ago, I took a DNA test provided by Ancestry, but the results were nowhere as comprehensive as my niece’s recent test results. Maybe I have to take another test?!
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