DNA in the News

The Genographic Project Announces Geno 2.0

Blaine Bettinger 12 Comments

Today, The Genographic Project officially announced the launch of their new Geno 2.0 project, a significant update to the type and quantity of genetic information that will be collected and analyzed by The Genographic Project.  The new project will use an entirely new SNP chip (the GenoChip) designed specifically for Geno 2.0 in order to provide the world’s most detailed information about Y-DNA and mtDNA haplogroups (using SNP information) as well as detailed biogeographical estimates and ancient population (Denisovan and Neanderthal) estimates.

As of today you can pre-order a Geno 2.0 kit, which is expected to ship no later than October 30th (although you can probably expect it earlier than that).

Once again Family Tree DNA will perform all the testing, and The Genographic Project has worked very closely with FTDNA to design, troubleshoot, and use the GenoChip.  FTDNA will perform both the Family Finder and the Geno 2.0 test. ... Click to read more!

AncestryDNA Officially Launches

Blaine Bettinger 2 Comments

I’ve written about Ancestry.com’s new autosomal DNA product, AncestryDNA, a number of times (see my review of the product at Ancestry.com’s AncestryDNA Product ).

Today, Ancestry.com announced the official release of AncestryDNA (see press release below).  It is initially available only to Ancestry.com subscribers, at a cost of $99.

The launch page is here.

Press Release:

Ancestry.com Launches new AncestryDNA Service: The Next Generation of DNA Science Poised to Enrich Family History Research

Affordable DNA Test Combines Depth of Ancestry.com Family History Database with An Extensive Collection of DNA Samples to Open New Doors to Family Discovery

Ancestry.com (Nasdaq: ACOM), today announced the launch of its highly anticipated AncestryDNA™ service, a new affordable DNA test that enables purchasers of the DNA test and subscribers of Ancestry.com to combine new state-of-the-art DNA science with the world’s largest online family history resource and a broad global database of DNA samples. ... Click to read more!

Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates Jr.

Blaine Bettinger 15 Comments

“Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates Jr.” is a new series from Henry Louis Gates Jr., who previously brought us series such as Faces of America, African American Lives, and African American Lives 2.  The show, which airs on PBS stations on Sunday nights, premieres March 25th, 2012 with singer/actor Harry Connick, Jr.

Last week I participated in a conference call with members of the show, including Senior Story Editor and Producer Leslie Asako Gladsjo and Chief Genealogist Johni Cerny.  Also on the call, although only able to participate for a few minutes, was Henry Louis Gates Jr.

Here are some interesting tidbits about Finding Your Roots – and genealogy in general – that I learned from the conversation:

  • Gates believes that genetic genealogy is deconstructing the notion of race; never has FTDNA or 23andMe returned an African American’s testing results and reported 100% African, for example.  In other words, science is demonstrating that things are much more complicated than we would have guessed without the benefit of DNA.
  • All guests on Finding Your Roots used both 23andMe and FTDNA for DNA testing – all African Americans participating in the series also used African Ancestry.  While the guests receive all their results, we may not always see them.
  • Many are still wary of genetic genealogy; many potential guests even turned down the series largely because of the DNA testing involved.
  • Gladsjo and Cerny noted that DNA is just another tool for the genealogist; sometimes the guests’ DNA results were very interesting, and sometimes they were “pretty boring.”

I hope you’ll be tuning in tomorrow to see Finding Your Roots.  I have a feeling that this is going to be a fascinating series. ... Click to read more!

Genetic Genealogy at Public Radio International

Blaine Bettinger 2 Comments

PRI’s The World, a weekday radio news magazine, has a new piece by producer Carol Zall entitled “Roots 2.0: Using DNA to Trace My Ancestry.”  The piece makes for a great introduction to genetic genealogy.  I especially like the 35-year-old interview between the young Carol and her grandmother, as well as Carol’s interpretation of her results.

I spoke with Carol a few months about this piece, and she included a few quotes from the interview in the article.  Also included is a 2-minute soundbite of our conversation:

Also featured in the main article are the always-fantastic Daniel MacArthur and Joe Pickrell (you can find both of them at Genomes Unzipped). ... Click to read more!

The Legal Genealogist Discusses Ancestry.com’s New Autosomal Testing

Blaine Bettinger 2 Comments

Over at The Legal Genealogist (one of my favorite new blogs!), blogger Judy Russell, J.D., CG discusses Ancestry.com’s new autosomal DNA testing service in “Science and the “10th” cousin.”

As I noted in a recent blog post (see “WDYTYA Reveals More Information About Ancestry.com’s New Autosomal DNA Testing“), autosomal DNA testing was featured in the recent episode of Who Do You Think You Are with actor Blair Underwood.  After revealing Mr. Underwood’s biogeographical estimates (74% African American and 26% European), they revealed a genetic cousin found in the Ancestry.com’s database:

The service identified a distant cousin (somewhere around the 10th cousin range) who lived in Cameroon (an Eric Sonjowoh). Mr. Sonjowoh was already in the Ancestry.com database, which is why they were able to compare him to Mr. Underwood. According to Eric, someone approached him in 2005 and asked him for his DNA because African Americans were trying to trace their family back to Cameroon. I’m not sure what database the DNA was in, but it shows that Ancestry.com has pre-populated its database with at least some samples from other public and/or proprietary data sources. ... Click to read more!

WDYTYA Reveals More Information About Ancestry.com’s New Autosomal DNA Testing

Blaine Bettinger 8 Comments

[Update (2/24/12): Some genealogy forums are reporting that callers to Ancestry.com are being told that the autosomal DNA test will publicly launch in approximately 1 month (late March or early April).]

Tonight’s episode of Who Do You Think You Are? featured African-American actor Blair Underwood. For those not familiar with Who Do You Think You Are, the 1-hour program examines the genealogy of a celebrity, typically focusing on one or two of their most interesting families.

DNA Testing

This episode was of particular interest to me because it featured Ancestry.com’s new autosomal DNA testing service, which I’ve written about before (see “Ancestry.com’s Autosomal DNA Product – An Update”). While there wasn’t too much new information about the DNA product in this episode, it was an interesting sneak peek at the service. ... Click to read more!

All the Latest in Genetic Genealogy and Personal Genomics

Blaine Bettinger 1 Comment

From my Twitter account (blaine_5), here are my tweets from the past few weeks (Feb. 4 – Feb. 20th), most of which are about genetic genealogy and personal genomics:

“Genetics and privacy” at john hawks weblog (@johnhawks) – “‘Privacy advocates’ seem like they’re living in the 1980’s” 

Feb 14, 12:19pm via HootSuite ... Click to read more!

23andMe is Hiring a Marketing Team

Blaine Bettinger 2 Comments

(I almost titled this post as “23andMe Bringing New Blood to Marketing,” but there’s nothing worse than a bad pun!).

Business Insider is reporting (“Sergey Brin’s Wife Is Hiring A Marketing Team For Her Gene Startup“) that 23andMe is looking to increase the marketing of their services.

In an interview with Business Insider, Anne Wojcicki reported that the company is creating a marketing team.  Indeed, I’ve seen at least one marketing position (VP of Marketing) offered by 23andMe in several locations over the past 2 weeks (see here and here, for example).  It looks like it would be a very interesting and fun position.

The article also notes that as of October 2011, the 23andMe database officially had 125,000 subscribers. ... Click to read more!

NFL Players Xavier Omon and Ogemdi Nwagbuo Confirmed as Half-Brothers

Blaine Bettinger

Direct-to-consumer DNA testing has led to the re-joining of yet another family.

Y-DNA and autosomal testing by Family Tree DNA has revealed that two NFL players , Xavier Omon (San Francisco 49ers)) and Ogemdi Nwagbuo (San Diego Chargers), are half-brothers.  ESPN has a long write-up of the story at “A brothers’ tale for Omon, Nwagbuo.”

Meeting for the First Time

The brothers had planned to meet face-to-face yesterday, September 1, 2011, as their teams met on the field.  Turns out Omon’s team, the 49ers, were victorious, meaning that if he’s anything like my brothers, he gave Nwagbuo a hard time about it!  The Mercury News has a story about the brothers’ first meeting at “Omon meets half-brother (a Charger) for first time,” and the SF Gate has a story at “49ers’ Xavier Omon meets half-brother.” ... Click to read more!

My Genome Online – A Challenge To You

Blaine Bettinger 5 Comments

As you may have heard, I recently made my 23andMe and Family Tree DNA autosomal testing results available for download online at “mygenotype,” and dedicated the information to the public domain (if dedicating DNA sequence to the public domain is even possible – I’m currently doing some research in this area and expect to write more in the future).

At “mygenotype” you can download the following:

My Family Tree DNA Results:

  1. Affymetrix Autosomal DNA Results (2010)
  2. Affymetrix X-Chromosome DNA Results (2010)
  3. Illumina Autosomal DNA Results (2011)
  4. Illumina X-Chromosome DNA Results (2011)

My 23andMe Results:

  1. V2 Results (2008)
  2. V3 Results (2010)
  3. Y-DNA Results (2010)
  4. mtDNA Results (2010)

You can also find my SNPedia Promethease reports:

In addition to my genome, Razib Khan of Gene Expression has a spreadsheet of approximately 48 other genomes that are available for download online.

A Challenge To YOU

Now that the information is out there, available to anyone who might be interested, it remains to be seen who might be interested in the information. ... Click to read more!