Why is it called a Y-Chromosome DNA Project?
A. This is because it uses the remarkable fact that the Y-Chromosome, which only males carry, passes almost unaltered from great great grandfather, to great grandfather, to grandfather to father to son etc. down along the male descendancy. All other chromosomes in the body take 50% of material from the mother and 50% from the father. So the Y-Chromosome is like a living fossil. Surname also follows the same succession. This Y-Chromosome has another useful feature. It changes very slowly, perhaps by one small piece over many generations. This makes it like a genetic clock, and by measuring how different the Y-Chromosome is between two people, we can tell approximately how many generations back they will have a common male ancestor. It is like counting the ticks of a clock. The chromosome is make up of a large number of distinctive “markers”. These markers have numerical values, and different people will have a different string of numbers as their markers. If they are close family the ma
Related Questions
- I have already had my DNA tested with Family Tree DNA. Can I join the Lost Colony Project with the test I’ve already had performed or do I need to have a new test?
- How can I share more related discoveries with my project members since there is nothing that automatically becomes public like Y-chromosome DNA results?
- Why is it called a Y-Chromosome DNA Project?
