Hi John thank you for the DNA information. I am not in America. Does anyone know if there are any labs in Australia that do this type of testing? Thanks for any help. Elizabeth In cloudy Canberra -----Original Message----- From: piggott-bounces@rootsweb.com [mailto:piggott-bounces@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of John Laws Sent: Saturday, 14 February 2009 5:03 AM To: piggott@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [PIGGOTT] DNA Testing for Genealogical Purposes Hi John, At 09:38 PM 2/12/2009, you wrote: > If anyone wants info on DNA testing, I would be happy to try and help > explain the process. > The list is slow these days. I would be happy if you would post a short bit on the value you are finding in having DNA data available, and the differences between paternal and maternal DNA research. Hello all! I will write a couple of emails for the group to explain how DNA Testing can be used for genealogical purposes. I am basing this on my personal studies and experiences, so if anyone has anything to add, please do! I will try and keep this as simple as possible in layman terms. I am afraid many avoid DNA testing because it looks complex to understand when explained by scientists. OVERVIEW OF DNA First, there currently are two types of DNA that can be tested that are currently of use for genealogists, Y-DNA and Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). If you remember back to basic biology in school, a male is made up of an X & Y chromosome and a female two X chromosomes. When we are conceived, the sperm from dear old Dad had an X-Y to contribute and determined what sex we are, plus we got an X-X from Mom's egg. If you are female, the three X's from your parents merged and you became an X-X. Like mixing paint, your color of X is a combination of your parents colors causing a lot of changes in the X from generation to generation. If Daddy has blue X and Mommy has yellow X then baby is going to have green X (blue mixed with yellow make green)! The X (to date) is not much use in matching family past a generation or two. There is another type of DNA they probably didn't tell you about in biology 101, Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). In layman's term, it is the skin of the chromosome that is passed down from mother to child, not merged with little change from generation to generation following the maternal line. As a male, my children have their mother's mtDNA and not mine. This has usefulness in genealogy, but is not as useful as testing the Y-DNA. If you are a male, then you are an X-Y. You got your Y from Dad alone, not mixed with anything. In fact, I have read that the average slight change in the Y-DNA occurs about once every eight generations. That means the male descendants of my great great uncle LAWS have basically the exact same Y-DNA as I do. This can be a powerful tool for genealogists! Y-DNA TESTING You are interested in following up on your family line or have a dead end you hope to get past. You contact a testing company and they start talking about two types of tests you can take, Single Tandem Repeats (STR) and Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNP) and your eyes glaze over and walk away. Let's simplify! Lets talk STRs and then SNPs (pronounced SNiP). The first thing you are going to hear is how many markers are you going to test, or if you have been tested you end up with a bunch of numbers and have no clue what they mean. The STR's are nothing more than measurements at specific spots along the chromosome. Think of them as your lottery number! Each 'marker' is a place that they take a measurement. They will ask you if you want to test anywhere from 12 to 67 markers. If you test for 12 markers, you get twelve numbers, your lottery number. If you find an exact match at 12 numbers, the odds may be about a million to one you are not related. The problem is there are hundreds of millions of people, so you may get a hundred matches that are not recent relatives (we are all related way back) mixed in with the relatives. So if you were to test 37-markers, you would get 37 numerical values and about a hundred million to one odds at a match that you are not related. I would recommend you start with at least the 37-marker test. I tested for 67, but then I am a DNA testing junkie! So you get the numbers back, what do you do with them? You compare them to others! In the early days of DNA testing you kind of were on your own to figure it out. Today, companies like Family Tree DNA have automated it all so it is easy! They just give you your matches and allow you to contact those who match. Further you can upload a GEDCOM and compare linages. In fact, they are the 'Microsoft' of DNA testing and are dominating the scene. They just did their 500,000 DNA test as a company. There is a free online database called Y-Search that allows you to self enter you DNA results. Or you can join projects, for instance surname or geographical projects such as the PIGGOTT project I mentioned in my previous email. HOW CAN DNA TESTING HELP ME IN MY GENEALOGY? I have been involved in DNA researching two of my lines, my LAWS line and my mother's family KNIGHT. For example, my mother researched her KNIGHT line for about 30 years, joining DAR and Colonial Dames of Virginia based upon her research, but never got beyond a Richard KNIGHT b. abt 1700, Surry County, VA. Her line's brick wall we probably all have hit in our research! This last year, I paid to have my 1st cousin (last male of our KNIGHT branch) DNA tested. I joined with the results the KNIGHT DNA PROJECT. It can be seen here: http://www.worldfamilies.net/surnames/knight/results My line is in Knight Lineage III as the K-37 entry. All five of us in Knight Lineage III are related part of the same bloodline. Of note, for my line is the K-26 entry as we have paper trails back to the same Richard KNIGHT. But more importantly is the K-30 Peter KNIGHT link! His family links back to the Jamestown settlement and stayed almost on the same land in Virginia for 150 years. Further, I have found a will in this family that lists a Richard Knight of the right time period and probably is my Richard Knight ( linages can be seen by hitting the patriarch tab). Bottom line is that DNA allowed me to know that we ARE related and then to try and figure out how! That being said, sometimes the data is not what you expect and can raise issues! Genealogists are now starting to understand that DNA shows that about one in eight births are the result of a non-parent event. I know of living 1st cousins that were both tested and the DNA didn't match! That means that one of their fathers (who were brothers) were not genetically their father. I personally had a case where in my LAWS line, I had traced my family back to a village in Norfolk County England in the early 1700's. Paper wise, I was able to link LAWS in about 5 villages within about a 20 mile radius as all related. When I tested my DNA I had a family match on a man surnamed ALEXANDER. He had a GEDCOM (family tree) that showed his dead end ALEXANDER to be living just a few miles outside of my circle, within about 12 miles of my GGG-grandfather in England. I popped off an email to Mr. Alexander, but it was a few days before I got an answer. I must admit after having spent significant time and even trips to England searching my LAWS line, it was stressful wondering if I was really an ALEXANDER! It turned out, his GGG-grandfather was illegitimate and ALEXANDER was the mother's maiden name with no record of who the father was. We found a LAWS family a couple of houses away on the census with three sons of similar age to his GGG-grandmother! SNP TESTING Next type of testing you might consider is SNP (pronounced SNiP) testing. A SNP is in fact a mutation. If you think of the human race as a tree, the R branch is the predominant major limb that are European males. These mutations are very rare, but every descendant will have the mutation. For instance, there was a Mr. R and he had two sons. One of the sons had a mutation. On the tree, there became an R1 (the son that did not mutate) and R2 (the son that has the mutation). All of their descendants can then be separated. In a sense, the R-limb split into two smaller branches. You can continue this back to twigs! For instance, my Knight line is R1b1b2a1a as was listed above. I have a suspicion that the PICKETT/PIGGOTT line may be from the "I" branch which has historical concentrations in Northern Germany and Scandinavia. This was probably a significant bloodline in the Saxons that invaded present day England. Part of my hypothisis is based upon the PIGGOTT project results where "I" branch has been found and part on my PICKETT relatives that were tall in stature, a genetic trait! My LAWS line has been tested down to a twig that is tested down to a small twig that there are only 5 of us in the world tested to so far. Three of us are from East Anglia region of England (SE coast of England), one from Northern Italy and one from southern Germany. These are my tribe cousins! It makes more sense when compared to DNA testings from early iron age remains that find my 'LAWS' tribe was in the Swiss lake region living in houses built on stilts over the water! They were part of the La Tene culture. How is that for tracing my family back in time! There is a new field of study that has been coined Anthrogenealogy, where through DNA testing of remains and carbon dating, you may be able to find out where your ancestors were at different times in history. WHO TO TEST A male of the PIGGOTT line! This may be a little more difficult than you realize! I tracked down a living PICKETT cousin in Texas who is a rancher. Can you imagine getting a telephone call from someone claiming to be a distant cousin and wanting you to submit a DNA test at the cousins expense? I was turned down. I'm still looking for someone of my line! WHERE TO TEST The best place to have someone tested is Family Tree DNA (FTDNA). They are becoming the Microsoft of DNA testing with most of the people now testing, therefore you get the best results. I previously tested with Relative Genetics but paid to be retested with FTDNA because of all the tools they offer! I would recommend you start with at least the 37-marker test. 12 markers is not enough! They offer 12,25,37 & 67 STR marker tests. 37 markers is the best value for the money with diminishing results from the 67 marker tests (although I did it). The test is a q-tip that they mail you and you rub inside your cheek. You just send it back in the envelope they provide. It takes a few weeks for the testing to be done. They will give you the results along with your projected SNP. If you look back to the Knight DNA project page, you will see some people in the project in red, such as R1b1b2 while my Knight is green and R1b1b2a1a. Green represents confirmed by testing; red is projected by FTDNA. mtDNA is the mother to mother equivalent DNA testing. I got this tested for free via Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation (SMGF), but found mtDNA lacking in usable results for DNA. Actually, I had so many matches (hundreds) that it lacked value for me. Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation (SMGF) also does Y-DNA testing. http://www.smgf.org/ Sorenson was a billionaire who funded this project as a hobby. It is free! But understand that they are not there to serve you, but rather are studying the human race! You must submit a family tree with your DNA sample (they have you spit in a small bottle and mail it back). You can get DNA results for yourself by periodically checking for yourself within the database. My parents both tested through them, It took almost a year before I appeared! The lab is a for profit lab that does the ancestry.com DNA testing. They are located at Temple Square in Salt Lake City (they are not affiliated with the Mormons) There is zero support. You have to understand DNA to make use of it. But if you can't afford mainstream testing, it is great! I'm not sure how, long this is going to continue though because the project has been publishing some results of population migration patterns recently. If one of you tests this way and needs help converting and interpreting the results, drop me a line and I will see if I can help! John Laws Vancouver, Washington, USA GGGGGG Grandson of John PIGGOTT SR. and Margery BROWN(E) m. January 18,1712, Nottingham MM, PA - Quakers PS I have significant research on this PIGGOTT/PICKETT line. Let me know if related. ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to PIGGOTT-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message