Lauren,
Eric Olsen has steered you in the best direction to learn about Y-DNA. As you will read
there, ONLY men can chart their Y-DNA in the CARROLL project. That means they should have
the CARROLL surname, suspect their ancestor was the son of an illegitimate birth and the
real father was a CARROLL, or were adopted and believe the original birth father was a
CARROLL. There is a different, more expensive test called MtDNA that tests only females.
A few days ago I wrote a letter to answer a question similar to yours for one of the 20
persons in a study group we have formed for the purpose of researching the 10 households
of Carrolls who were in Sampson County, NC in 1790. I don't know if that letter will
add to your understanding or not, but I will share it and hope that it might.
Lura
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Y-DNA??
Well, there isn't a simple way to explain it, but I'll give a try at pointing you
to the place you can learn more. The first thing I would suggest if your ISP and modem
are fast enough is that you watch all the videos at
http://www.familytreedna.com/videoaudio.html
You probably already have a media player new enough to show the video, but if you get a
pop-up saying you need xxxx media player, I would suggest you install Windows Media
Player. You can get it on that same page as well as at Microsoft.
Next, I think following the links at the following site will give you a great deal of
information.
http://www.familytreedna.com/dna101.html
There is a rather comical demonstration showing how to actually do the collection of DNA
by scraping the inside of cheeks.
http://davedorsey.com/dna.html
For pricing information regarding the Y-DNA test, go to
http://www.familytreedna.com/surname_join.asp?code=F25174&special=True
Near the bottom, click the arrow to expand the items in the "Type of Test" box.
There you will see the Y-DNA12 is $99, Y-DNA25 is $169, and Y-DNA37 is $219.
I would highly advise anyone to get the 37 marker test. There will be too many false
positives later with just 12 or 25. Someone will match on 12 numbers and will try to use
that to "PROVE" close kinship with someone to whom he really isn't closely
related in the last maybe 500 years.
Each kit has a number. That number is all that is posted on the FTDNA website with the
table of markers. See:
http://www.familytreedna.com/public/carroll/
Each one is asked to give at least 3 generations of their KNOWN ancestors, some give more,
some just write private. At the CARROLL site maintained by Kevin Carroll, he posts the
lineage if given, but not the name of the person (they all start with pvt.)
http://www.childtalk.com/History/carrollfamilydna.html
What information will the donor receive?
http://www.familytreedna.com/CertReports.html
will give you an idea of the information that a man gets personally from the test. The
certificate and report received in the regular USPS mail are things that can be filed away
for the children and grandchildren to keep. The values listed there for the different
markers (alleles) can be compared with others now and at any time in the future. That is
one reason I am glad that FamilyTreeDNA (FTDNA) was chosen for the CARROLL test. FTDNA has
done 37,000 tests since 2000, and is chosen by 9 out of 10 genealogists. I think the
standards they are using will be used for years to come.
As I understand it.... The markers being used for genetealogical purposes are some of the
many markers the human body has that would not be useful for diagnosis of illness and
therefore not important to insurance companies. They are sometimes called junk markers. I
know, "God don't make no JUNK!" These markers are just part of what makes us
who we are! Anyway, the companies doing genealogical testing found many markers in the
human body from which to choose that would not be useful for any other purpose. The 37
chosen by FTDNA seem to quickly be becoming the standard.
FTDNA also sends the volunteer a password when they receive their report. Using that
password, they can access several pages of information that help them interpret the
report. Some of this information also goes to the project administrator - in this case
Kevin Carroll.
http://www.familytreedna.com/ftLogin.asp?kit=Demo-2&code=A2418
has a demonstration of the type of material to be accessed online only by the one who has
the password. Clicking on the available tabs gives information on the individual used as a
demo. All the tabs of the sample report would be helpful for the Y-DNA Project except the
last 3. They are for the female only MtDNA test.
This is a 12 marker report. If you do 37, you get a 37 marker report.
http://www.familytreedna.com/tr_Y12M.pdf
http://www.familytreedna.com/markerschart.html
Want more?
http://nitro.biosci.arizona.edu/ftdna/TMRCA.html
Follow the links here:
http://www.kerchner.com/kerchdna.htm