Geno 2.0 - The Website

My Geno 2.0 test results arrived Tuesday night.  HURRAY!!!!

The website which is still in Beta testing has the following sections:

YOUR STORY includes how and when your distant ancestors moved out of African and the various populations with which they interacted over thousands of years of migration.  The migration is determined by tracing mutations in your Y-chromosome DNA (if you are a male) for paternal lines and on your mitochondrial DNA for maternal lines.  Your haplogroup (basically your twig on the World Family Tree) is given as an alternating series of letters and numbers.  A short video is available on the site.

YOUR MAP are pages begin with your oldest known ancestors in Africa and shows your ancestors’ migration out of Africa for your maternal line and if you are a male, also for your paternal line.   Each page is a haplogroup and as you click on the next section, you see how that haplogroup changed to the next haplogroup and how your ancestors migrated.  Below the map on each page is interesting background about each haplogroup is given including its location of origin and time.  A Heat Map indicates the frequency of your haplogroup in the areas it has been found.  The FUTURE section shows the entire migration for all haplogroups, but the information on the page indicates that as more data is found, more detail will appear.  There is also a request for you to complete your profile and contribute your story.  This enables you to tell what you know about your maternal and paternal lineages and as others add their story, you will be able to read them if you match them.

WHO AM I? displays how you affiliate with nine world regions.  As this is determined from your entire genome that is tested, your percentages include information from both of your parents going back six generations.  This reflects both recent influences and ancient genetic patterns as various groups mixed over thousands of years.  As your ancestors mixed with extinct hominid cousins such as the Neanderthals and Denisovans (/dɪ̈ˈniːsəvən/) these are included.  A short video is found on this page.

Two major populations are listed for each person.  My personal population percentages are:

43% Northern European which states that my results are found at the highest frequency in areas of the UK, Finland, Russia and Germany in the current reference populations, and to lesser degrees throughout the rest of Europe.  This is probably the earliest hunter-gatherers in Europe and who moved from the Middle East during the Neolithic period about 3,000 years ago.

37% Mediterranean with the highest frequencies in southern Europe and the Levant people (people from Sardinia, Italy, Greece, Lebanon, Egypt and Tunisia.  It is at lower frequencies in the rest of Europe, the Middle East, Central and South Asia.  This group migrated from the Middle East around 8,000 years ago during the Neolitic period and likely form the western part of the Fertile Crescent.

18% Southwest Asian is found at the highest frequencies in India and the area including Tajikistan and Iran.  It is at fewer frequencies in Europe and North Africa.  Again, the movement was probably during the Neolithic period and possibly from the Fertile Crescent.  The site states:  “Individuals with heavy European influence in their ancestry will show traces of this because all Europeans have mixed with people from Southwest Asia over tens of thousands of years.”

Below this the site explains what all this means and clarifies that it does not mean that I belong to these groups or are from these regions, but that these groups have a similar genetic match to me.  It further asks me to remember that this is a mixture of my past six generations and ancient patterns established over thousands of years.

My first reference population is considered British (UK).  This reiterates that my line is among the first hunter-gathers who arrived more than 35,000 years ago and that the Mediterranean and Southwest Asian percentages came later with the spread of agriculture from the Fertile Crescent.

My second reference population is considered German.  This connects me to people who are native to Germany.  This essentially states the same as the information for British and states that both northern and central European populations link to the earliest Europeans and the later movement from the Middle East.

You can click on a link to see information on all the reference populations as well as information on how the analysis was conducted, a description of all the nine regions and an example of a participant’s result discussed by Dr. Spencer Wells.

Below all that is my Hominid Ancestry for which I can click on a link to learn more details about the Neanderthal and Denisovans.

I am 2.2% Neanderthal.  National Genographic states:  “Everyone living outside of Africa today has a small amount of Neanderthal in them, carried as a living relic of these ancient encounters. A team of scientists comparing the full genomes of the two species concluded that most Europeans and Asians have between 1 to 4 percent Neanderthal DNA.”

I am 1.6 Denisovan.  National Genographic states that this may well change as they are “working to determine the best way to assess the percentage Denisovan ancestry that you carry. “

OUR STORY contains your paternal and maternal matches.  It is the section where you can read the personal stories your matches post about their lineages.  You are the center circle and those most closely related are nearer to you.  A legend indicates the level of relationship based on the size of the circle. By clicking on your circle you are offered a space of up to 1400 characters to write your story.  Another link allows you to see all those who have posted a story.  You can scroll to your haplogroup to see who has posted.  There is a guided tour to view.

PROFILE is the section which asks for cultural information on yourself and your recent ancestors in order for National Genographic to learn more about recent migrations and further refine their understanding to where people migrated today.  You can also click to be put in the scientific research study, and then complete sections entitled:  Account Settings, About Me, About My Family, About My Ethnicity, and Expert Option.*  
.......*Note that it is not extremely clear as to your oldest male and female for which to answer these questions of location.  I believe the goal is to do your oldest known female from your ALL-FEMALE line and the same for your ALL-MALE line even though this is not clear.  I have requested that it be make clearer.  Otherwise, we will have information that stems from other branches of our lineage and even the oldest male and female could be a married couple on the same line.

Transfering your Geno 2.0 results to FTDNA
Go to PROFILE and then to EXPERT OPTIONS.  Follow the prompts and add information (kit and passwords) for appropriate tests you have taken:  Geno 2, Geno 1, Y-DNA and/or mtDNA.
At this point in time there seemed to be a bug in some attempts to transfer data, but that appears to be resolved.  If you find a problem report it to FTDNA and try what I did:  I did not test Geno 1.0 with National Genographic, but transferred my HVR1 to them.  I was able to transfer my Geno 2.0 data to Family Tree DNA only when I did not enter the kit number for my Geno 1.0.

Also know that for males when they transfer their Geno 2.0 test to FTDNA, they will see all the National Genographic SNPs (Single Nucleotide Polymorphism) for which they test positive for their Y-DNA portion.  This will definite add to the string of letters and numbers for many haplogroups, but remember that everyone will soon be using the first letter of your haplogroup and the terminal (last) SNPs for which you test positive.  One of my I2b people is now I-Z183.

Other Features
On many pages you can click SHARE in the upper right to email your page to others, post on one of the social networks or download to your computer.

Be sure to check the FAQs and other items under RESOURCES.


REMEMBER, the current National Genographic website is in Beta so there will be bugs, and there may be some changes as issues are fixed and features added. The email to report problems is  Genographic@ngs.org

Haven't ordered your test yet?  Go to the National Genographic webiste and join the other 559,515 participants!

Emily
copyright 16 Dec 2012