To all with Portuguese blood, I was recently contacted by Mr. Ugo Perego of Brigham Young University, the Events Coordinator for the Molecular Genealogy Research Project. Many of you already heard about this project, but I have selected several quotes from our recent correspondence which deals with the topic of my message: "My name is Ugo Perego and I have been working for the past 2 years on a project known as Molecular Genealogy. The main purpose of this project is to develop a genetic map of the world that will be used as a new genealogical tool to assist individuals with blocked genealogies to trace the origin of their family lines even in the absence of written records. You can learn more about this study by visiting our website at http://molecular-genealogy.byu.edu ...." "To make this database functional, we will need at least 100,000 people with ancestry from all over the world. Currently, over 22,000 individuals have contributed to the research by donating a copy of their pedigree chart and a small sample of blood (6cc). These first 22,000 participants are showing us where we need to collect the next samples (we have two pie charts on our website that show the distribution of the participants' ancestry at http://molecular-genealogy.byu.edu/collect.htm). Eventually, we will need to go to some specific countries to collect the needed samples, however, many international samples can be collected right here, in the US, since almost everyone in this country came from somewhere else. I would like to find a couple hundred individuals with Portuguese ancestry to add to our database." So Mr. Perego has asked for my help to find enough people interested in participating in this project and who can come to the Sacramento, California area and give a blood sample. This is the first message of this topic which is just to see what kind of response I can get and hope that people will quickly reply to this message who are willing to participate. But there are some restrictions and not everyone will be qualified. Here are more details: "People with good genealogies are preferred since it is vital for this research to know the exact place and date of birth of the ancestors born in other countries. I am also interested in having groups organized in Portugal and Brazil (we might be able to go to southern Brazil in July). We can travel there if there are enough people willing to participate. If someone has ancestors in Portugal or in any other country within 4 or 5 generations, this is all they need to submit with their DNA sample in order to participate. Extended pedigree charts are needed only when the ancestors immigrated many generations back in time. Only direct lines are needed (donor, 2 parents, 4 gparents, 8 ggparents, etc). Only names, places and dates of birth are needed on the pedigree." "... we need names, palces of birth and dates of birth of all the 15 individuals of the 4 generation pedigree chart shown at: http://molecular-genealogy.byu.edu/pedigree.htm." I suggested to Mr. Perego that it would be good to get a variety of people who represent all of the 9 islands of the Azores, along with Madeira, and of course the continent. And I am certain people from other areas where Portuguese settled, i.e. Macau, Brasil, Timor, Cabo Verde, etc, would be very welcome. In response to this idea, I received this comment: "... variety would be great and having people from different parts of Portugal (mainland and isles) will help us diversify the Portuguese population as well. This means that if we have enough representatives in our database from each Portuguese location, we will eventually be able to discern one place against another." For this reason, I am very excited about the possibility that we could narrow down locations so precisely. I think it would be possible to distinguish between someone from Madeira and Terceira, or Corvo and Santa Maria, etc. I think that getting a group of Portuguese together would be somewhat wasted if we didn't have a talk about something. For this reason, I suggested maybe I could talk about some aspect of genealogy. I got this response: "The idea of a lecture is great. We can begin with a lecture on Molecular Genealogy where we explain the purpose of the project. Then, as people will take turns to have their blood drawn (we can only do 6-8 at the time), you can give a lecture about genealogy." "Theoretically, based on the data that we have collected so far, we might need only 177 great-grandparents born in Portugal. This means that if we have a person that is 100% Portuguese, he/she would be the equivalent of 8 great-granparents and therefore to collect the required number, I would need 177/8 = about 23 individuals that would have complete genealogies up to the fourth generation, all born in Portugal. However, we are aware that it is very unlikely that someone in the US might have all 8 great-grandparents born in Portugal and have all the information that we need about each one of them (names, birthdates and places of birth). These 177 "genetic equivalents" can be found in a larger populations of individuals with one or more documented lines from Portugal. There is not a limit to how many we would like to have in the database. Exceeding the required number will simply help increasing the probability and the likelyhood to identify specific genetic markers for a population of origin. Also, anyone is more than welcome to participate in this project, regardless of their geographic background. The reason I am focusing on the Portuguese population is simply because you are an expert in this field of genealogy. For each population I know how many people we have and how many we might need and I am writing similar emails to other people that can help me in targetting these specific populations." ____________________ Ugo A. Perego, MS Events Coordinator Molecular Genealogy Research Project Web: http://molecular-genealogy.byu.edu Email #1: ugo@relativegenetics.com Email #2: molecular-genealogy@byu.edu Fax: (801)461-9761 or (801)378-1576 Ph: (801)461-9775, (801)378-1245 or (801)404-0653 Mail: 775 WIDB Brigham Young University Provo, UT 84602 USA ____________________ So here is my plan. I think that sometime in January 2002 would be a good time for this event. The location can be at the LDS Family History Center in Sacramento. I haven't checked, but I imagine it could instead be at the LDS library in Elk Grove or even at the LDS Stake center down the street from my home in Galt. The main thing is that it will be somewhere in the Sacramento area. There is a need for licensed nurses to draw the blood samples. I am assured by Mr. Perego that he can line that up, but my idea is that if any Portuguese nurses are out there who want to do it, that would also be great. Since it is required that all who participate have a complete genealogy back to their great-grandparents, and since everyone who wants to participate might not have such exact information, I can be hired to trace the Portuguese ancestry, if necessary. As I mentioned, I would like to see a well-rounded gathering of people with diverse Portuguese ancestry and so I will be keeping track of which areas are represented, right down to the village. I would like to see at least one person from each and every Azorean village, for example. I know this is not so realistic unless we get a very large group, but it is my theoretical goal. So if you are interested in participating, please let me know right away so I can monitor the interest and see if we can pull off this event in this area. If we can't get enough qualified participants we can't do the event, since it would not be worth the expense for them to fly out here from Utah and hire the nurses, etc. for only a handful of people. So if you don't have a complete genealogy back to your great-grandparents, but want to participate, get rolling on your research or contact me for professional help. Feel free to forward this message to anyone or any group who might be interested in this project. I hope to hear from a lot of people very soon. Sincerely, Doug da Rocha Holmes www.dholmes.com/rocha2.html Professional Genealogist (Açores & Madeira) Specializing in the islands of Terceira & Pico 1035 Starbrook Drive Galt, California 95632 USAGet more from the Web. FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com