Here’s a cool clip I just pulled off of slashdot (with the link):
“For less than $200 and a cheek-swiped cotton swab, you will soon be able to add DNA results to family tree Web sites. Ancestry.com plans to launch the DNA testing product by the end of summer, offering customers the possibility of finding DNA matches in the site’s 24,000 genealogical databases. By taking a simple cheek-swab test and comparing results against DNA profiles in a test-results database, virtually anyone can uncover genealogical associations unimaginable just a few years ago. Users can easily connect with and discover lost or unknown relatives within a few generations, as well as gain insight into where their families originated thousands of years ago.”
I wonder how many people actually do this, and whether it will kick off later. I guess most families won’t be willing to spend $200 on this, but if a lot of people did it, it would have the potential to be really cool.
I would be interested if someone else did the research and I could just read about it.
I did read somewhere some shocking statistic about how many people didn’t have the father they thought, or the child or whatever –and I didn’t believe it. I wonder if that was the same source.
Has anyone else read about what people often find out when doing geneological/dna testing? Apparently they often find that a relatively (ho ho, relative, get it?) large number of people are not related the way they thought they were. That is, fathers turn out not to be fathers. People who do genetic counseling have to deal with this–whether to tell or not?
I’m vaguely interested. But I’m more interested in the descendants. Or whatever you call the ones coming after me. I better ask Marshall.
This seems neat to trace origins or whatever — and it’s a neat concept. But I doubt I’ll ever do it — I’m not interested in my ancestors at all — are you?