Genetic testing - Genographic Project

Howard Wallace

Howard Wallace

.
Moderator
Joined
Feb 23, 1999
Messages
4,855
Red Flower and I just got done swabbing our cheeks for DNA samples so we can participate in the Genographic project. See https://www3.nationalgeographic.com/genographic/ This project is mapping historical migration routes of humans through looking at genetic markers on the Y chromosome, passed from father to son, and at the mitochondrial DNA, passed from mother to her children.

My maternal aunt got her results recently. Since we share the same mitochondrial DNA, baring recent mutations, her results hold for me too. My mitochondrial DNA is in haplogroup H, the most common for those of European descent. This is no surprise, since an earlier statistical analysis of my Mother's DNA showed almost 100% European.

I'll get the results of the paternal lineage in a few weeks, as this swab I'm sending in will be analysed for the Y chromasome.

Red Flower is getting tested for the mitochondrial DNA, as that is her only option as a female. It's interesting that there are limitations on participating in the project from China, as China has restrictions on the export of genetic material. Since she's here though, she can send off a sample with no difficulty. She will probably be an interesting addition to their worldwide database, as a native Beijinger with no identified foreign blood. I'm sure her relatives are going to be interested in the results. Her parents just got visas to come visit us, and hopefully we can have some results by the time they get here.

Are any other forumites participating in this project?
 
In a somewhat cynical move, I purchased one of these kits for my younger brother last Christmas. It turned up as Haplogroup J2.

Upon showing the results to my father, he remarked: "Your mother is Jewish and my mother is Italian. I could've told you this for a lot less money."

Needless to say, it wasn't much of a surprise but it was rather interesting. I've thought about purchasing one for myself just to be sure, but some of those jokes about my looking like the mailman strike a bit close to home occasionally.

I'm beginning to suspect that the entire thing is just a plot by National Geographic to gather genetic data on select individuals for an eventual cloned army of culturally sensitive and educational world domination. If you thought that one Rishar around here was too many...well, stand by.

Edit: Almost didn't catch the joke there, Munk. The purity of your essence is great indeed.
 
Saw on Nova that archeologists are now DNA typing ancient skeletal remains. Apparently you can drill into an intact tooth and extract the necessary materials. I know, it's hard to believe, hard to believe a knuckledragger like me actually watches Nova. :rolleyes:

Sarge
 
my ex-wife has already told me that i am an over-weight, over-sexed neanderthal dinosaur of uncertain parentage with the sensitivity and intelligence of a dumb rock. why pay good money to be told so again. cost me enough the first time! ;)
 
Neat. I'd heard of it; didn't know how to get involved. Bookmarked for next month. Fun budget blown on sharpenables.

AA :thumbup:
 
Some interesting DNA stuff I heard was that the DNA evidence showed that the "Black Hebrews" of Africa really did have Jewish DNA, and that too bad for the Mormons, that the Native Americans did not.
 
Did you and Red Flower ever get your results back from the Genographic Project? I ordered a kit after reading your thread and got the results today. My mitochondrial DNA says haplogroup "M*"; guess that's not too surprising since my mother's side of the family is full-blooded Okinawan. We're rumored to have some Caucasian blood on my dad's side of the family, so I'll have to send a kit to my brother and see what his results look like. :thumbup:
 
I wish we did live in a world where some people had extraordinary abilities, and some of these persons became super heros. Naturally, we could hunt the others down and eradicate them.



munk
 
Thanks for the heads up....As a high school teacher, I'm going to jump right into this one. I suspect, however, from his profile above, that I will be the same haplogroup as Kronkew.
 
Novadak said:
Did you and Red Flower ever get your results back from the Genographic Project? I ordered a kit after reading your thread and got the results today. My mitochondrial DNA says haplogroup "M*"; guess that's not too surprising since my mother's side of the family is full-blooded Okinawan. We're rumored to have some Caucasian blood on my dad's side of the family, so I'll have to send a kit to my brother and see what his results look like. :thumbup:
Click to expand...

Nova,

Please accept my apologies for the delay in responding. I was on vacation and just got back to a computer and saw your question.

Red Flower's mitochondiral DNA put her in haplogroup F. This is another of the Asiatic haplogroups. It split off from haplogroup R somewhere in central Asia. Interestingly, my mitochondrial DNA marks me as in haplogroup H, which also split off from R in central Asia, but headed towards Europe. It seems Red Flower and I are distant cousins on our mother's sides.

The really interesting result was from the analysis of my Y chromasome. The first results were indeterminate and they had to take a few extra weeks to do some more detailed extra analysis of my sample. It is haplogroup E3a(M2).

While all of the haplogroups trace their roots back to Africa, E3a(M2) never left the continent. The precursors swirled around northern Africa, finally settling in sub-Saharan Africa. Most people in sub-Saharan Africa, and many African Americans are members of this haplogroup.

I'm black. You guys are going to be paying me reparations soon. I do accept PayPal.

One interesting corrillary is that I must have come by my family name of Wallace by an unconventional manner. The Y chromasome is passed from father to son in the same way as the family name is. However, my Y-chromasome traces back to Africa, while my name traces to Scotland. Unless there is a tribe of Wallaces in the Congo, one of my ancestors probably adopted the name of Wallace.

I have blue eyes. As a child my hair was blonde, although it has darkened to a brown/black as I aged. It would be interesting to do a more complete analysis of my genetics to determine what percentage composition I have, instead of just tracing the matrilineal and patrilineal lines. My mother had this done and she is almost 100% European. With that data and a statistical analysis of my genome I could make a pretty good guess as to how long ago the African influence came in. However, that analysis is considerably more expensive so it may be a while before I do it.

My sister has worked for some years on our family geneology. She had suspected some African influence in our family but thought it was from a woman. Since women can't pass on a Y chromasome the genetic data shot a hole in her theory. She is busy re-evaluating the historical data to make sense of it.
 
Howard Wallace said:
Nova,
My sister has worked for some years on our family geneology. She had suspected some African influence in our family but thought it was from a woman. Since women can't pass on a Y chromasome the genetic data shot a hole in her theory. She is busy re-evaluating the historical data to make sense of it.
Click to expand...
Before totally abandoning your sister's pet hypothesis, consider that a female, WALLACE by marriage, may have had a child of mixed parentage, which child would have then carried the WALLACE name forward. This may have occured before, during or after leaving said marriage. I believe this to have been the case with some indian genetics in my own family.
 
jurassicnarc44 said:
Before totally abandoning your sister's pet hypothesis, consider that a female, WALLACE by marriage, may have had a child of mixed parentage, which child would have then carried the WALLACE name forward. This may have occured before, during or after leaving said marriage. I believe this to have been the case with some indian genetics in my own family.
Click to expand...

Interesting possibility. Such a female could have even been Wallace by birth and unmarried. I'm not sure of the conventions for naming bastard children, but my sister should know.

I can't help but speculate that the probability during the slave years was greater for a black female slave to be impregnated by a white master than for a white woman to mate with a black male. The latter lower-probability event apparently occurred in my family. I will bet that many of the "black" people walking around the US today have a paternal lineage that traces back directly to Europe.

It brings a whole new light to the concept of "cultural diversity."
 
HW.

I'm not intending to take you to task. Everyone, anyone, please don't read this as such.

Do you think that 'Bastard' is still an appropriate term for a child born out of wedlock?
 
45-70 said:
HW.

I'm not intending to take you to task. Everyone, anyone, please don't read this as such.

Do you think that 'Bastard' is still an appropriate term for a child born out of wedlock?
Click to expand...

Yes.

bastard. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1). Retrieved August 27, 2006, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=bastard&x=17&y=12

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1) - Cite This Source new! bas‧tard  /ˈbæs
thinsp.png
tərd/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[bas-terd] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun 1.a person born of unmarried parents; an illegitimate child. 2.Slang. a.a vicious, despicable, or thoroughly disliked person: Some bastard slashed the tires on my car. b.a person, esp. a man: The poor bastard broke his leg. 3.something irregular, inferior, spurious, or unusual. 4.bastard culverin. –adjective 5.illegitimate in birth. 6.spurious; not genuine; false: The architecture was bastard Gothic. 7.of abnormal or irregular shape or size; of unusual make or proportions: bastard quartz; bastard mahogany. 8.having the appearance of; resembling in some degree: a bastard Michelangelo; bastard emeralds. 9.Printing. (of a character) not of the font in which it is used or found.
[Origin: 1250&#8211;1300; ME < AF bastard, ML bastardus (from 11th century), perh. < Gmc (Ingvaeonic) *b&#257;st-, presumed var. of *b&#333;st- marriage + OF -ard -ard, taken as signifying the offspring of a polygynous marriage to a woman of lower status, a pagan tradition not sanctioned by the church; cf. OFris bost marriage < Gmc *bandstu-, a n. deriv. of IE *bhendh- bind; the traditional explanation of OF bastard as deriv. of fils de bast &#8220;child of a packsaddle&#8221; is doubtful on chronological and geographical grounds]

&#8212;Synonyms 6. fake, imitation, imperfect, sham, irregular, phony.


Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1) - Cite This Source new! bastard culverin&#8194;
Military a 16th-century cannon, smaller than a culverin, firing a shot of between 5 and 8 lb. (11 and 17.6 kg).
Also called bastard.

[Origin: 1540&#8211;50]


Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source new! bas·tard (b
abreve.gif
s
prime.gif
t
schwa.gif
rd) Pronunciation Key
premium.gif

n.
  1. A child born out of wedlock.
  2. Something that is of irregular, inferior, or dubious origin.
  3. Slang. A person, especially one who is held to be mean or disagreeable.
adj.
  1. Born of unwed parents; illegitimate.
  2. Not genuine; spurious: a bastard style of architecture.
  3. Resembling a known kind or species but not truly such.

[Middle English, from Old French, probably of Germanic origin; akin to Old Frisian b
omacr.gif
st, marriage.] bas
prime.gif
tard·ly adj.
(Download Now or Buy the Book) The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law - Cite This Source new! Main Entry: bas·tard
Pronunciation: 'bas-t&rd
Function: noun
: an illegitimate child
NOTE: The word bastard is no longer used in legal contexts. &#8212;bas·tardy /'bas-t&r-dE/ noun
Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law, © 1996 Merriam-Webster, Inc.WordNet - Cite This Source new! bastard
adj 1: born out of wedlock; "the dominions of both rulers passed away to their spurious or doubtful offspring"- E.A.Freeman [syn: bastardly, misbegot, misbegotten, spurious] 2: fraudulent; having a misleading appearance [syn: bogus, fake, phony, phoney] n 1: insulting terms of address for people who are stupid or irritating or ridiculous [syn: asshole, cocksucker, dickhead, shit, mother fucker, motherfucker, prick, whoreson, son of a bitch, SOB] 2: the illegitimate offspring of unmarried parents [syn: by-blow, love child, illegitimate child, illegitimate, whoreson] 3: derogatory term for a variation that is not genuine; something irregular or inferior or of dubious origin; "the architecture was a kind of bastard suggesting Gothic but not true Gothic" [syn: mongrel]
WordNet ® 2.0, © 2003 Princeton UniversityEaston's 1897 Bible Dictionary - Cite This Source new! bastard
In the Old Testament the rendering of the Hebrew word _mamzer'_, which means
"polluted." In Deut. 23:2, it occurs in the ordinary sense of illegitimate
offspring. In Zech. 9:6, the word is used in the sense of foreigner. From the
history of Jephthah we learn that there were bastard offspring among the Jews
(Judg. 11:1-7). In Heb. 12:8, the word (Gr. nothoi) is used in its ordinary
sense, and denotes those who do not share the privileges of God's children.
Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary
Click to expand...

You will note that my usage is the accepted one, listed first in almost every dictionary. I think it an abomination to degrade the precision of the English language as we try to circumvent imaginary slights to silly and overdeveloped sensibilities.

By the way, just whom do you think I insult when I use the appropriate dictionary term to discuss a hypothetical illegitimate ancestor of my own?

Moderators - Feel free to edit any of my language that does not meet the standards of Bladeforums.
 
Howard?

I wasn't attempting to take you to task, and I even stated that I wasn't. I was merely asking if anyone thought that was an appropriate term to use.

We have quit using many terms for referring to people over the last 50 years, ones that were once thought proper.

as for "By the way, just whom do you think I insult when I use the appropriate dictionary term to discuss a hypothetical illegitimate ancestor of my own?" Why did you apparently take insult?
 
munk said:
Sorry; I must safe guard all my prescious bodily fluids....




munk
Click to expand...


That made me laugh, man! I have images of Munk riding a thermonuclear bomb going through my head right now... :D

Good stuff. Ya know, I've thought of doing that. Would be pretty interesting!

Chris
 
45-70 said:
Why did you apparently take insult?
Click to expand...

I'm not insulted, I'm just a crotchety old guy.

Sometimes I feel like I have to take on 1000 Philistines with only the jawbone of a creature that is kind of like a horse, but not a horse. It's smaller, and it makes a different sound. It has bigger ears too.

There's some that might think I have possesed such a jawbone for some time.

;)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top