Posted on 06/15/2005 11:34:14 AM PDT by blam
The Genographic Project
Public participation, including yours, is critical to the Genographic Project's success.
Here's how you can get involved:
Purchasing a Public Participation Kit will fund important research around the world—and open the door to the ancient past of your own genetic background.
With a simple and painless cheek swab you can sample your own DNA. You'll submit the sample through our secure, private, and completely anonymous system, then log on to the project Web site to track your personal results online.
This is not a genealogy test and you won't learn about your great grandparents. You will learn, however, of your deep ancestry, the ancient genetic journeys and physical travels of your distant relatives.
To insure total anonymity you will be identified at all times only by your kit number, not by your name. There is no record, no database that links test results with the names of their contributors. If you lose the kit number there will be no way to access your genetic results.
As your own genetic ancestry is revealed you'll also see worldwide samples map humankind's shared genetic background around the world and through the ages.
If you'd like to contribute your own results to the project's global database you'll be asked to answer a dozen "phenotyping" questions that will help place your DNA in cultural context.
This process is optional and completely anonymous, but it's also important. Each of us has a part in the ancient story of humankind's genetic journey. Together we can tell the whole story before it's too late.
Order a Kit The Participation Kit costs U.S. $99.95 (plus shipping and handling and tax if applicable). The kit includes:
1. DVD with a Genographic Project overview hosted by Dr. Spencer Wells, visual instructions on how to collect a DNA sample using a cheek scraper, and a bonus feature program: the National Geographic Channel/PBS production The Journey of Man. 2. Exclusive National Geographic map illustrating human migratory history and created especially for the launch of the Genographic Project. 3. Buccal swab kit, instructions, and a self-addressed envelope in which to return your cheek swab sample. (You can download a pdf of instructions or the consent form. You will need Acrobat Reader.) 4. Detailed brochure about the Genographic Project, featuring stunning National Geographic photography 5. Confidential Genographic Project ID # (GPID) to anonymously access your results at this Web site
The purchase price also includes the cost of the testing and analysis—an expensive process—that will take place once your sample is sent in.
Return Your Kit Once you have completed the cheek scraping process, you will secure the scrapers inside the transport tubes, sign the informed consent form and mail the tubes and form off to the lab.
That's it! In about 4 to 6 weeks—the time necessary for the laboratory to correctly analyze your DNA—your results will be ready. In the meantime, visit the Web site to see where your sample is in the analysis process.
Get Your Results Samples will be analyzed for genetic "markers" found in mitochondrial DNA and on the Y chromosome. We will be performing two tests for the public participants:
Males: Y-DNA test. This test allows you to identify your deep ancestral geographic origins on your direct paternal line.
Females: Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). This tests the mtDNA of females to identify the ancestral migratory origins of your direct maternal line.
To be clear—these tests are not conventional genealogy. Your results will not provide names for your personal family tree or tell you where your great grandparents lived. Rather, they will indicate the maternal or paternal genetic markers your deep ancestors passed on to you and the story that goes with those markers.
Once your results are posted, you will be able to learn something about that story and the journey of your ancestors. The genetic profile you receive is more than a static set of data. It is like an ongoing subscription to your genetic history. Your profile might become more detailed as the Genographic Project amasses more data from around the world, so be sure to return to the Genographic Project Web site for project updates.
Public participation is critical to the Project's success. By purchasing a Genographic Project Public Participation Kit, you will not only contribute to the impact of this great endeavor, but you may discover something about your own genetic past as well.
A Note on Privacy To ensure the privacy of participants, we have built an anonymous analysis process. Your Participation Kit will be mailed with a randomly-generated, non-sequential Genographic Participant ID number (GPID). Although we will have mailed a Participation Kit to your address, we do not know the random code included in the Kit. When you send in your DNA sample with your consent form, they will only be identified by your GPID. Therefore, your cheek cells will be analyzed completely anonymously.
In order to access your test results, you will need to access the Genographic Project Web site and enter your GPID, so it is very important that you do not lose your GPID. See the Genographic Project Terms and Conditions for more information. Also, be sure to visit our FAQs.
For International Participants (outside the United States and Canada) Public participation may be restricted in some countries where the export of genetic material requires government approval. China is one country that has such restrictions in place. The Genographic Project will work with the relevant authorities to achieve the broadest level of public participation possible.
Oh, *bluuuuush*.
< |:)~
Huh? What phenotyping questions?
If you'd like to contribute your own results to the project's global database you'll be asked to answer a dozen "phenotyping" questions that will help place your DNA in cultural context.
There are some things better left unknown.
We haven't got to that part of the project yet. My husband's results have been received by the testers but haven't been processed. My mother actually did give me her sample to mail today. And I have decided to punt and mail the sample I was going to give to my dad to my brother instead, just to avoid interpersonal weirdness.
But I would guess that the "phenotype" questions are just that - height, weight, color of hair, color of eyes, maybe ABO type.
A year or so ago they had an article on testing men in Lebanon, looking for the Phoenicians. I think that's way cool.
My mother's mtDNA is going to be some variation on Native American, because her mother's mother was part Chippewa.
No idea what my father's family's mtDNA will be, when I get one of his cousins to agree to take the test, but his mother was supposed to be part Cherokee.
I've done genetic testing at the Universith of Pittsburgh because I have rheumatoid arthritis, which is supposed to have a genetic component. Finding a cure would be so wonderful.
One of my earliest memories is my mother listening to the radio during the Hungarian uprising and crying because we weren't helping them.
I was born August 1952 so was quite young.
Right on, twin. I knew I had one somewhere!
A Family Tree in Every Gene [Races DO Exist: NYT]
NY Times Op-Ed Page | March 14, 2005 | ARMAND MARIE LEROI
Posted on 03/14/2005 3:10:30 AM PST by Pharmboy
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1362319/posts
Pretty interesting; I may be tempted to give it a shot. We've traced my father's family back to Germany, but about the time of the French Revolution, any trace of us disappeared. My Dad likes to imagine we were French aristocracy who fled to Germany and made a new life, but BAH! I'd hate to pay one hundred bucks to find out I'm French, LOL!
The Franks and the Germanii were both Teutonic tribes, so I doubt they can tell the difference. Pretty much all Northern Europe was Teutonic except for the Celts and the Basques.
Well, that shows how little I know :-)
Geographic Society Is Seeking a Genealogy of Humankind
NY Times | April 13, 2005 | NICHOLAS WADE
Posted on 04/13/2005 3:33:59 AM PDT by Pharmboy
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1382672/posts
Swab - and go into the database that IBM's building...
???????????
So what island are you from?
DId you participate in this survey too? Any results?
AW, poop -- the graphics at post 74 have since been deleted.
I'll have to find them & upload them again.
I have not participated....might though,, although I have a decent idea where great grandparents came from....northern europe,...England, Denmark, Germany.
For men, the NG project will trace back your y-chromosome DNA (your father's father's father's father's father's father's father's father's father's father's father's father... etc.); for women, it traces their mitochondrial x-chromosome DNA.
Other services will trace BOTH your y and x chromosomes, but they're pricier.
Same here! This is so interesting.
From what I know, i'm all Italian. My parents came here to the US in the early 70s. Many generations before them also nothing but Italian. I'm so curious though what else might be there. I'd be so interesting to find out.
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