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Discovering
your GeoFather™
using the Y chromosome
The Y chromosome
provides a very powerful tool for discovering ancestral male lineages.
This is because, unlike other chromosomes, the major part of its
DNA does not get changed when it is passed down from father to
son.
Occasionally, however, when a Y chromosome is passed on, its genetic
code does undergo a very small alteration. The vast majority of
these alterations are completely harmless and so are eventually
passed on to succeeding generations. Over time, further small
alterations occur. In this way, separate male lineages become
increasingly different from each other.
Because it is only males that inherit a Y chromosome, analysis
based on this genetic material can only be performed on male DNA.
However, women may obtain this information by using a sample from
a male relative such as a brother or father.
Building
a global family tree
By
comparing two men’s Y chromosomes, it is possible to judge
how closely they are related. If their genetic codes are very
similar, we can say that they share a common male ancestor in
the recent past. The more differences that have accumulated in
their genetic codes, the more generations have passed since their
last common ancestor.
Scientists have used this basic principle to compare the DNA from
thousands of men living all across the planet. They have used
their findings to construct a global family tree of male ancestors.
The
journeys that shaped history
This
male family tree is rooted some 100,000 years ago, at a time when
the ancestors of all modern humans were living in Africa. As some
of these early groups of humans took their first tentative steps
out of our ancient homeland, their journeys led them in different
directions and their family lines gradually began to diverge.
It is these different lineages that form the separate branches
of the global family tree.
GeoGene has divided the male family tree into 17 unique accounts
tracing the most important of these journeys – the ones that
would define the course of subsequent human history. The account
we send you will reveal the route your own paternal ancestors
took as they left Africa, explaining how and when your ancestors
arrived at the part of the world in which their genetic inheritance
is most visible today. You might, for example, learn that you
inherited your Y chromosome from one of a number of groups of
hunter-gatherers who arrived in Europe around the time of the
Great Ice Age. Or you might discover that you are descended from
a group of Neolithic farmers who journeyed into Europe from the
Near East after the Ice Age had ended, bringing with them agricultural
knowledge that would change our way of life forever. Or perhaps
you are descended from another ancestral lineage.
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