Y chromosome test

[Cragside]

Hi All,
         I've been looking for living family of my grandad over the last few years and have finally discovered an individual who may be my cousin.
In order to show that we share the same grandad I'm thinking of having a Y Chromosome test done. Has anyone had this test done and if so can you recommend a company who i could contact to carry out the test.
Thanks.

[clayton bradley]

I have only used FTDNA but I would certainly recommend them. There are other possibilities, as I'm sure others will tell you.

[davidft]

If you do a YDNA test you want it to be at a higher level to rule out spurious matches. This means testing at Y67 or even Y111 if you can afford it. Both you and your match will have to test so that bumps up the cost. ftDNA is a good company in my opinion and have sales from time to time so something to look out for.

Doing this test for this one person is putting a lot of eggs in one person so to speak and the likelihood of finding another who you could compare with on the Y chromosome may take a long time if ever. I only mention this to point out the lottery nature of these tests, the opposite side of the coin of cause is that you could get an exact match first time out.

So another type of test you could look at is an autosomal test (family finder test). This test doesn't specifically look at the Y Chromosome but looks at what you inherit from your parents, their parents and so on and from that predictions of relatedness can be made eg cousins, second cousins etc. The downside is it does not tell you where about in your tree a map will be but is more a tool to help track relationship and maybe fill gaps in a tree. So although less precise than the Y DNA it is more assistance when looking at a broader picture so maybe something to keep in mind

[Palladium]

Someone will tell me if this is wrong......

Autosomal DNA is a term used in genetic genealogy to describe DNA which is inherited from any of the chromosomes, not the sex chromosomes. Humans have 22 pairs of autosomes and one pair of sex chromosomes (the X chromosome and the Y chromosome) - 23 pairs in total. Autosomal DNA is shared by all decendants and can be used to confirm ethnicity percentages and close relationships with a high level of accuracy.

Females have two X chromosomes and do not inherit a Y chromosome.
Males get a Y chromosome from their father and their father's line.
X chromosomes are passed down from both parents to all their children. So, an X or mix of X's could be from both parents (and g'parents etc.).

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is passed from the mother to all her children of both sexes.

The inheritance of X-chromosome DNA follows an interesting pattern, from a defined set of ancestors. Added to that, the inheritance pattern is different for males and females.
Males only have one X-chromosome, inherited from their mother (the Y-chromosome comes from the father), so their X-DNA is purely from the maternal half of the family (but not all branches).
Females inherit one X-chromosome from the mother and another from their father, so have X-DNA from both paternal and maternal lines (but again, not from all branches).

Good luck
Roger

[clayton bradley]

Once you have the result of your test on FTDNA you can join a group for your haplogroup and perhaps your surname and the moderators on those groups will give you excellent advice, which may be slightly different depending on whether you are an R or an I. There are some good general advice groups on Facebook as well.

[sugarfizzle]

"Autosomal DNA is shared by all decendants and can be used to confirm ethnicity percentages and close relationships with a high level of accuracy."

I think most of us here would disagree with this statement. Ethnicity percentages are something to look at briefly as a source of amusement, they certainly don't as yet confirm it with a high level of accuracy.

And although autosomal DNA is passed down to descendants, it is in ever decreasing amounts, and you may share little or no detectable DNA with a 4th or even 3rd cousin.  Close relationships can usually be confirmed with closer relationships, but not in all cases.  However, it should confirm a first cousin relationship and I would suggest that it would be a better test than Y test for your purposes, and it will give you leads on other lines as well as davidft has already said.

Regards Margaret

[Ruskie]

Autosomal tests are a lot cheaper too. 

[hdw]

Once you have the result of your test on FTDNA you can join a group for your haplogroup and perhaps your surname and the moderators on those groups will give you excellent advice, which may be slightly different depending on whether you are an R or an I. There are some good general advice groups on Facebook as well.

Like most people who have their DNA tested, I was intrigued to find out my Y DNA haplogroup, which is the very common R1b-L21 (my mtDNA is J1c2, also very interesting). However, as time goes on and I get my autosomal test results, I wonder why we make such a fuss about our haplogroup. Modern research suggests that the Y DNA R1b haplogroup is associated with the Bronze Age invaders of western Europe who came from the Eurasian steppes, but according to FTDNA, only 14% of my DNA comes from "Metal Age Invaders", so although they gifted my my Y DNA haplogroup, fully 86% of my DNA comes from hunter-gatherers and Neolithic farmers, making my R1b inheritance look pretty insignificant.

Harry

[Cragside]

Thanks for the replies guys. Very helpful. I’ll keep you all informed.