FamilyTree DNA have released a beta version of a project related Group "message board".
Two of my projects are participating in this and FTDNA would appreciate any feedback.
FFLornaHen - my autosomal dna project primarily for my relations and those that match them, or those I help with their dna data
RUNCIMAN.
FFLornaHen's MyGroups postings are entirely private to the project members
RUNCIMAN is publicly visible but only project members can post.
Read about how to use them in FamilyTreeDNA's Learning Centre
https://www.familytreedna.com/learn/?s=mygroups
When you log in there will be a notification bar across the top of the page with a link and email address for feedback.
Monday 8 December 2014
Wednesday 26 November 2014
Holiday sale time for DNA kits
FamilyTreeDNA have provided Group Administrators with an announcement of a set of discounts valid until the end of December, along with mystery rewards.
Great time to explore family relationships using FamilyFinder, or chase those theories about whether or not those "three brothers who emigrated" were really brothers by using y_DNA.
Go to http://FamilyTreeDNA.com, check that the sale prices below are shown, select your test, order and join in the wonderful fun of adding science to your genealogy.
Great time to explore family relationships using FamilyFinder, or chase those theories about whether or not those "three brothers who emigrated" were really brothers by using y_DNA.
Go to http://FamilyTreeDNA.com, check that the sale prices below are shown, select your test, order and join in the wonderful fun of adding science to your genealogy.
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Finally, remember that the FTDNA offices are closed the Friday after Thanksgiving. If you call and leave a message, it’s critical that you speak clearly. Please be sure to leave your contact phone number and/or email address, and the group or kit number about which you’re calling. As always, if an attempt is made during the sale period to contact us about a
purchase, we will honor the sale price - and in this case, the coupon
price, too.
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Friday 24 October 2014
Transfers
Here's the official announcement from FamilyTreeDNA. If a number of you want to club together to chain together your transfers and get a free unlock, post a comment against this post. |
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Monday 20 October 2014
Free transfer of your autosomal dna to FamilyTreeDNA
Family Tree DNA recently announced an incentive system for transfers from ancestry and 23andme (v3 chip only, so only those who tested before about Dec 2013 can transfer from 23andme).
Here's Kitty Cooper's blog post about it
http://blog.kittycooper.com/2014/10/free-transfer-of-dna-data-from-ancestry-to-family-tree-dna/
Notes from the official announcement from FamilyTreeDNA to their volunteer group administrators (such as myself) are below.
This should be of particular interest to those who have only tested at Ancestry.com as they simply do NOT provide you with sufficient information to check which ancestor was responsible for your dna match.
A tree match is just a simple pointer on where to do the traditional research to show the linkage indicated. It is not necessarily where your dna match is.
To find who passed on a particular segment of dna to you and your match(es), you need to find which spot on which chromosome you share with others and work together to then determine if it is a triangulated match, ie person A matches both person B and person C on chromosome n from point x to point y AND person B matches person C at the same spot.
Until you have checked that person B also matches person C, you don't yet know if your matches are from the opposite sides of your pair of chromosome n, or the same side, which can still be from either of your paternal or maternal ancestry until you have more clues.
Once you have checked however, you do now know that a common ancestor between you all is responsible for passing that particular bit of dna that has survived down the generations to you. You may be pleasantly surprised to find completely different tree linkages!
Ancestry does not provide the tools necessary to do this.
FamilyTreeDNA does, as do 23andme, and of course, GEDMatch.com who accept raw data files from all three companies for comparisons.
So, if you are interested in maximising your investment in your dna test with Ancestry in particular, do consider this transfer.
Club together to get the referrals working for you.
If you have a surname from any of the DNA projects listed on the top rhs of this blog do consider joining your appropriate project after you have transferred your data. They aren't just for Y-dna, we accept all clues for the ancestry of the surname and their connections, which autosomal dna certainly provides, albeit less directly than y- or mt-DNA.
If you are one of my relations, or already know you are a dna match to myself or one of my close relations, please also consider joining my autosomal dna project FFLornaHen so that we can work together to explore our genetic heritage and break down some of those brick walls.
From the FamilyTree DNA announcement to Group Administrators:
Here's Kitty Cooper's blog post about it
http://blog.kittycooper.com/2014/10/free-transfer-of-dna-data-from-ancestry-to-family-tree-dna/
Notes from the official announcement from FamilyTreeDNA to their volunteer group administrators (such as myself) are below.
This should be of particular interest to those who have only tested at Ancestry.com as they simply do NOT provide you with sufficient information to check which ancestor was responsible for your dna match.
A tree match is just a simple pointer on where to do the traditional research to show the linkage indicated. It is not necessarily where your dna match is.
To find who passed on a particular segment of dna to you and your match(es), you need to find which spot on which chromosome you share with others and work together to then determine if it is a triangulated match, ie person A matches both person B and person C on chromosome n from point x to point y AND person B matches person C at the same spot.
Until you have checked that person B also matches person C, you don't yet know if your matches are from the opposite sides of your pair of chromosome n, or the same side, which can still be from either of your paternal or maternal ancestry until you have more clues.
Once you have checked however, you do now know that a common ancestor between you all is responsible for passing that particular bit of dna that has survived down the generations to you. You may be pleasantly surprised to find completely different tree linkages!
Ancestry does not provide the tools necessary to do this.
FamilyTreeDNA does, as do 23andme, and of course, GEDMatch.com who accept raw data files from all three companies for comparisons.
So, if you are interested in maximising your investment in your dna test with Ancestry in particular, do consider this transfer.
Club together to get the referrals working for you.
If you have a surname from any of the DNA projects listed on the top rhs of this blog do consider joining your appropriate project after you have transferred your data. They aren't just for Y-dna, we accept all clues for the ancestry of the surname and their connections, which autosomal dna certainly provides, albeit less directly than y- or mt-DNA.
If you are one of my relations, or already know you are a dna match to myself or one of my close relations, please also consider joining my autosomal dna project FFLornaHen so that we can work together to explore our genetic heritage and break down some of those brick walls.
From the FamilyTree DNA announcement to Group Administrators:
.. for the first time ever, people that have taken an AncestryDNA™ or 23andMe©
(V3) test can transfer into the FTDNA databases for free by visiting https://www.familytreedna.com/AutosomalTransfer? and following the instructions to upload their raw data file.
Within an hour or two, we provide a preview of what’s waiting if they transfer by showing the top 20 matches along with an estimate of the total number of matches in the FTDNA database.
Full functionality can be unlocked by either paying $39 or recruiting four other people to upload, thus unlocking the rest of the matches.
Here are some important points to know:
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As of Friday afternoon, Ancestry was experiencing difficulty with file downloads. ... If you (or your group members) have previously uploaded files to GEDmatch, there’s a fair chance the download will still be on your computer. Look for a filename like dna-data-yyyy-mm-dd.zip.
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We only accept the 23andMe V3 chip that was used on tests sold between November 2010 and approximately November 2013. There are a couple of ways to find out what chip was used for your test other than simply the timeframe. One is size; v3 chip files are about 7.83 MB where V2 and V4 chips are smaller. If you’re tech savvy, you can unzip the file and check chromosomes: Chromosome 1 for v3 starts at 82154 (rs4477212) where v4 starts at 734462 (rs12564807)and v2 starts with position 742429 (rs3094315).
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We do not have any plans to accept V2 or V4 chips. if you try to upload the wrong chip version, the system will tell you that the file doesn’t have sufficient data. Since neither chip contains enough of the SNPs included in Family Finder, we would have to impute too much data. Basically we’d have to make assumptions about the missing SNPs that we’re just not willing to make at this point.
Wednesday 10 September 2014
More on Ancestry atDNA
Yes, I've been spending a little more time on my thousands of AncestryDNA matches lately even though many, the majority of them by some accounts, will turn out to be false positives.
Yes, I do sometimes wonder if the money spent (and hoops you have to jump through to get a test when you live outwith USA) has been worth the effort you have to expend to see if the leafy hints to genealogy may be new genetic, as well as papertrail, relatives that will get me through my brick walls.
Yes, I've found some new papertrail relations, but conventional research could have got me there eventually without the DNA test.
I've recently reminded myself of Shannon Christmas' useful blogpost on getting the most out of your Ancestry results.
To all of my Ancestry DNA matches who may search as far as here on my sites, I particularly draw your attention to this wonderful comic (linked to on Shannon's blog) which explains better than I, on why I keep suggesting that you upload your raw data from Ancestry to GEDMatch.
There's a whole world out there that doesn't necessarily believe we should trust what we are told by Ancestry without the evidence to back it up.
Let's use the great tools available to us and work together to break down those brick walls.
Do also use their newly introduced Share results feature.
It is a step on the way to more useful tools in that it allows you to see whether one of your matches, also matches someone you are sharing with - NOT that you know you all share the same common ancestor without exploring further at the chromosome comparison level.
Here's Angie Bush's blogpost about sharing your results on Kitty Cooper's blog
and an explanation of Triangulation - which is not the same as In Common With - from Roberta Estes blog
Yes, I do sometimes wonder if the money spent (and hoops you have to jump through to get a test when you live outwith USA) has been worth the effort you have to expend to see if the leafy hints to genealogy may be new genetic, as well as papertrail, relatives that will get me through my brick walls.
Yes, I've found some new papertrail relations, but conventional research could have got me there eventually without the DNA test.
I've recently reminded myself of Shannon Christmas' useful blogpost on getting the most out of your Ancestry results.
To all of my Ancestry DNA matches who may search as far as here on my sites, I particularly draw your attention to this wonderful comic (linked to on Shannon's blog) which explains better than I, on why I keep suggesting that you upload your raw data from Ancestry to GEDMatch.
There's a whole world out there that doesn't necessarily believe we should trust what we are told by Ancestry without the evidence to back it up.
Let's use the great tools available to us and work together to break down those brick walls.
Do also use their newly introduced Share results feature.
It is a step on the way to more useful tools in that it allows you to see whether one of your matches, also matches someone you are sharing with - NOT that you know you all share the same common ancestor without exploring further at the chromosome comparison level.
Here's Angie Bush's blogpost about sharing your results on Kitty Cooper's blog
and an explanation of Triangulation - which is not the same as In Common With - from Roberta Estes blog
Friday 29 August 2014
Y-DNA discounted until 3 Sep 2014
This just in from FamilyTree DNA.
A good time to upgrade to Y-DNA67...
A good time to upgrade to Y-DNA67...
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Friday 22 August 2014
Ancestry DNA - lack of chromosome browser
Please support this petition to get ancestry to provide a chromosome browser with their autosomal dna tests:
http://www.change.org/petitions/ancestry-com-dna-llc-give-ancestrydna-customers-dna-segment-data-a-chromosome-browser-now
Without the specifics of how well, where (which chromosome) our matches match us, and who else matches them, the money spent on a dna test on ancestry is just an expensive way to find hints to others' trees with no evidence whatsoever.
We shouldn't have to rely on (excellent) third party tools such as those at GEDMatch to get access to the useful parts of what we've paid for.
http://www.change.org/petitions/ancestry-com-dna-llc-give-ancestrydna-customers-dna-segment-data-a-chromosome-browser-now
Without the specifics of how well, where (which chromosome) our matches match us, and who else matches them, the money spent on a dna test on ancestry is just an expensive way to find hints to others' trees with no evidence whatsoever.
We shouldn't have to rely on (excellent) third party tools such as those at GEDMatch to get access to the useful parts of what we've paid for.
Wednesday 20 August 2014
Henderson DNA
Those interested in the (very small) subset of the overall HENDERSON DNA that belongs to the family of Archibald & Margaret (McEWAN) HENDERSON, can check out the addition to the HENDERSON Lineages pages of an autosomal dna (atDNA) section.
(Remember to check specific surname project diaries in the links to the right for their progress.)
(Remember to check specific surname project diaries in the links to the right for their progress.)
Tuesday 19 August 2014
FTDNA postage changes
From FamilyTree DNA to group administrators:
".. As of Monday,
we'll begin including domestic return postage in the cost of shipping
and handling. ... For both domestic and international shipping, the fee will
now be a consistent $9.95."
Wednesday 11 June 2014
Father's Day Sale
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For the Y-dna, FAIRBAIRN and RUNCIMAN in particular, we are gradually working our way down the Y-DNA haplogroup tree using nominated a nominated representative, but don't let that stop any of you curious about the refinement of your haplogroup, the more data the better!
Sunday 27 April 2014
DNA & Arbor Day sale
DNA Day is a holiday celebrated on April
25. It commemorates the day in 1953 when James Watson, Francis Crick,
Maurice Wilkins, Rosalind Franklin and colleagues published papers in
the journal Nature on the structure of DNA. Wikipedia
I wonder if they realised what they started in the way of genetic genealogy?
FamilyTree DNA are havine a short sale to celebrate both this and the launch of their updated Y_SNP tree.
A good time to be in if you've been thinking about testing, and/or refining your position on the haplogroup tree of mankind.
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Saturday 29 March 2014
Two new Australian Projects
From Gail Riddell (via NZDNA project and Rootsweb Genealogy-DNA list):
"I write to advise (with much pleasure) that FTDNA have given their approval to me to pioneer two new Australian Projects.
They are both categorised as Dual Y DNA and mtDNA Geographical projects and the only person currently within either of them is me. :~)
Consequently, I need to broadcast this far and wide as I am aware we have many Australian testers within our ranks. (Even if you have ONLY tested atDNA (Family Finder) to date, it matters not. Just join.
The "Australian Convicts" project is primarily aimed at those poor sods (male and female) who faced the tribulations of that unknown sea journey in the late 18th century. It will also welcome those who were later transferred to Norfolk Island.
The "Australian Settlers" project is aimed at anyone whoever entered the land as a settler or traversed the rigours of the Convict status and became bone fide settlers.
If you are interested in joining, the Convicts project is at http://www.familytreedna.com/public/AustralianConvicts/
The Settlers Project is at http://www.familytreedna.com/public/AustralianSettlers/
Very little in the way of blurb has been prepared at this time, although it will come.
If you join, you will need to supply me with either the Fleet and the ship on which your ancestor(s) arrived (for the former) and the port(s) of arrival of your most distant Australian immigrants (both direct male lineage and direct female lineage). If you have only tested atDNA (FF), then that information is unnecessary.
If you do NOT know on which ship your convict ancestor arrived, please do NOT join the Convict project and opt only for the Australian Settlers project.
Kind regards
Gail Riddell"
"I write to advise (with much pleasure) that FTDNA have given their approval to me to pioneer two new Australian Projects.
They are both categorised as Dual Y DNA and mtDNA Geographical projects and the only person currently within either of them is me. :~)
Consequently, I need to broadcast this far and wide as I am aware we have many Australian testers within our ranks. (Even if you have ONLY tested atDNA (Family Finder) to date, it matters not. Just join.
The "Australian Convicts" project is primarily aimed at those poor sods (male and female) who faced the tribulations of that unknown sea journey in the late 18th century. It will also welcome those who were later transferred to Norfolk Island.
The "Australian Settlers" project is aimed at anyone whoever entered the land as a settler or traversed the rigours of the Convict status and became bone fide settlers.
If you are interested in joining, the Convicts project is at http://www.familytreedna.com/public/AustralianConvicts/
The Settlers Project is at http://www.familytreedna.com/public/AustralianSettlers/
Very little in the way of blurb has been prepared at this time, although it will come.
If you join, you will need to supply me with either the Fleet and the ship on which your ancestor(s) arrived (for the former) and the port(s) of arrival of your most distant Australian immigrants (both direct male lineage and direct female lineage). If you have only tested atDNA (FF), then that information is unnecessary.
If you do NOT know on which ship your convict ancestor arrived, please do NOT join the Convict project and opt only for the Australian Settlers project.
Kind regards
Gail Riddell"
Friday 28 March 2014
mtDNA 4 day sale
Family Tree DNA have announced the following:
Orders need to be placed and paid for before 11:59 PM Central Time April 1, 2014.
To order an upgrade to an existing kit, log into your account at FamilyTreeDNA.
If not already tested at FamilyTreeDNA, simply order a new kit.
If you have a specific problem able to be solved by testing two matrilineal descendants, now is the time to be in.
Alternately you may simply be interested in your deep maternal ancestry, thousands of years ago, or wish to contribute to the overall knowledge of womankind.
For general genealogical timeframes however, mtDNA isn't all that useful unless you have a full sequence match and a good maternal line papertrail.
Savings
mtDNAFullSequence Addon and New Kits - Was $199 US Now $139 US
mtHVR1toMEGA Upgrade - Was $149 US Now $99 US
mtHVR2toMEGA Upgrade - Was $159 US Now $89 US
Orders need to be placed and paid for before 11:59 PM Central Time April 1, 2014.
To order an upgrade to an existing kit, log into your account at FamilyTreeDNA.
If not already tested at FamilyTreeDNA, simply order a new kit.
If you have a specific problem able to be solved by testing two matrilineal descendants, now is the time to be in.
Alternately you may simply be interested in your deep maternal ancestry, thousands of years ago, or wish to contribute to the overall knowledge of womankind.
For general genealogical timeframes however, mtDNA isn't all that useful unless you have a full sequence match and a good maternal line papertrail.
Wednesday 26 March 2014
Haplogroup R1 tree
Chromo 2 results received for a descendant of Archibald HENDERSON have allowed a few more branches to be added to the Haplogroup R1 tree (which is by no means complete, only showing those on the site who have agreed for the DNA results to be shown, and is using a mix of old and new terminology for the branches).
Many thanks to those on the FamilyTree DNA R-L21 project who analyse such things to help us place our ancestors on the overall trees.
So far we know that there is at least one other person on the same branch (terminal SNP concerned is S7361).
Even though this branch of the Y-tree is still (presumably) well back from genealogical timeframes it would be good to hear from others down the same branch of L1335 > L1065>S744>S691>S7361 to compare notes on our respective ancestry.
If all this terminology is bewildering, check out the ISOGG Wiki, and join an appropriate message board or mailing list, eg the RootsWeb Genealogy-DNA list
Many thanks to those on the FamilyTree DNA R-L21 project who analyse such things to help us place our ancestors on the overall trees.
So far we know that there is at least one other person on the same branch (terminal SNP concerned is S7361).
Even though this branch of the Y-tree is still (presumably) well back from genealogical timeframes it would be good to hear from others down the same branch of L1335 > L1065>S744>S691>S7361 to compare notes on our respective ancestry.
If all this terminology is bewildering, check out the ISOGG Wiki, and join an appropriate message board or mailing list, eg the RootsWeb Genealogy-DNA list
Tuesday 14 January 2014
T2e
The maternal haplogroup chart has been updated to include a branch for T2e - mainly because my own 2*great grandmother (Amelia MILLAR)'s direct maternal descendant's full results have arrived.
A quick web search indicates that this is unlikely to help me break through that particular brick wall in a hurry.
A quick web search indicates that this is unlikely to help me break through that particular brick wall in a hurry.
Friday 10 January 2014
Are you getting the most out of your investment?
Here's what looks like another fantastic tool (Autosomal DNA Analyser) to help you explore your matches.
Roberta has written up some great instructions on her DNA Explained blog.
There goes what I was set to do today!
Roberta has written up some great instructions on her DNA Explained blog.
There goes what I was set to do today!
Tuesday 7 January 2014
Learn more
Remember that FamilyTree DNA has a useful Forum.
Do register and check for interesting discussions and announcements.
In the Announcements section, Rebekah Canada (Web Presence and Customer Engagement, Family Tree DNA) has just posted the schedule for Live DNA Webinars from FTDNA in January, along with links to on demand Webinars already available.
Check out what's there at the above Forum link.
Given their recent launch of X chromosome features the one on X Chromosome Matches may be a hot favourite.
Others cover managing your personal account, and explaining your results (part 3 on FamilyFinder) and many more from DNA basics to advanced topics, I quote, "about the genetics and usage of Y-DNA testing. We will cover the following topics: NIST standards, compound markers, palindromic & multi-copy markers, genetic distance models, modal values & triangulation, micro-alleles, recurrent SNPs & SNP discovery projects."
Do register and check for interesting discussions and announcements.
In the Announcements section, Rebekah Canada (Web Presence and Customer Engagement, Family Tree DNA) has just posted the schedule for Live DNA Webinars from FTDNA in January, along with links to on demand Webinars already available.
Check out what's there at the above Forum link.
Given their recent launch of X chromosome features the one on X Chromosome Matches may be a hot favourite.
Others cover managing your personal account, and explaining your results (part 3 on FamilyFinder) and many more from DNA basics to advanced topics, I quote, "about the genetics and usage of Y-DNA testing. We will cover the following topics: NIST standards, compound markers, palindromic & multi-copy markers, genetic distance models, modal values & triangulation, micro-alleles, recurrent SNPs & SNP discovery projects."
Friday 3 January 2014
Family Tree DNA X matches
Have you done a FamilyFinder test with Family Tree DNA?
If so, this post from CeCe Moore's blog may be of interest as FTDNA have released a set of new tools for exploring your X chromosome matches.
Your download matches from the Chromosome Browser now contain a chr. 98, FamilyTree DNA's name for your X chromosome data.
Haven't had too much time to experiment as yet, but the "match" criteria seems to be lower than the default setting on GedMatch.
Remember that if you have a tree on WikiTree you can easily see who you contributed to your X chromosome.
Log in, select the person of interest and click on DNA in the menu.
Under each person are several symbols which indicate the type of dna the person has
Y (males only, inherited from their father, and passed on to sons), X for all of us, but for your ancestors, X will only show under those who contributed to the root person's X chromosome, mt for us all, but only inherited from your mother (and passed on by daughters), au for automsomal dna, inherited from all of your ancestors, but significant amounts really only detectable for dna matches back to your ancestors 4-6 generations away.
If you click on an ancestor's Y, mt, au or X symbol as you will be sent to the section of the page dealing with who contributed to the X chromosome of the person concerned, remember to scroll up to see the pedigree again.
If so, this post from CeCe Moore's blog may be of interest as FTDNA have released a set of new tools for exploring your X chromosome matches.
Your download matches from the Chromosome Browser now contain a chr. 98, FamilyTree DNA's name for your X chromosome data.
Haven't had too much time to experiment as yet, but the "match" criteria seems to be lower than the default setting on GedMatch.
Remember that if you have a tree on WikiTree you can easily see who you contributed to your X chromosome.
Log in, select the person of interest and click on DNA in the menu.
Under each person are several symbols which indicate the type of dna the person has
Y (males only, inherited from their father, and passed on to sons), X for all of us, but for your ancestors, X will only show under those who contributed to the root person's X chromosome, mt for us all, but only inherited from your mother (and passed on by daughters), au for automsomal dna, inherited from all of your ancestors, but significant amounts really only detectable for dna matches back to your ancestors 4-6 generations away.
If you click on an ancestor's Y, mt, au or X symbol as you will be sent to the section of the page dealing with who contributed to the X chromosome of the person concerned, remember to scroll up to see the pedigree again.
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