It's in the genes . . .

Focus back on genetic genealogy this morning, after receiving two emails last night.

The first came from Sorensen Molecular Genealogy, letting me know that they have updated their webpage to include preliminary data on mitochondrial DNA (that's the genetic material you inherit from your mother, and her mother, and her mother, and her mother, etc., etc.)

Unfortunately, I was disappointed to find that my sample was not amongst the preliminary batch. So, I'll have to keep checking back.

But, it did revive my interest in my Y-line (that's the genetic material you inherit from your father, and his father, and his father, etc., etc.)

I may have mentioned here in previous posts that my home PC crashed a couple weeks back, taking with it all my DNA data (among other things). So, the visit to SMG wasn't a complete waste, as it allowed me to download my genetic markers to the new PC.

Just when I completed that, I received the second interesting email. This one from Brett Morgan up in Baltimore, whose Y-line matches mine. We have been unable, as yet, to figure out exactly where our two lines converge. But, the genetic evidence is just too uncanny for there not to be a connection somewhere.

Anyway, Brett had a "Deep SNP" test done on his sample. Previous testing had grouped our bunch of Morgans in Haplotype "I." Now, the deep testing refines things a bit, and classifies us as part of Haplotype "I1c."

According to Brett, "The I1c lineage likely has its roots in northern France. Today it is found most frequently within Viking/Scandinavian populations in Northwest Europe and extends at low frequencies into Central and Eastern Europe."

Interesting stuff, no?