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A cool genetic visualization tool

Rob Spencer is a scientist who’s developed a set of tools for use with DNA results — visualizing some of our genetic genealogy.

He calls his website, Tracking Back, a place “for genetic genealogy tools, experimentation, and discussion.” And he offers a lot — to think about, and to play with.

One tool in particular is really neat for seeing the historical track of our ancestors from the dawn of time forward to modern times. And all we need to use it is our haplogroup — our position on the human family tree that we get from YDNA testing (if male) or mtDNA testing (if female or male, since we all inherit our mitochondrial DNA from our mothers).

So here’s the historical path of my maternal line, mtDNA haplogroup H3g, back to the earliest female ancestors of the human race (click on the image to enlarge it):

H3g

And, using the YDNA haplogroup of my brothers, here’s the historical path of my direct paternal line, YDNA haplogroup E-V13, back to the earliest male ancestors of the human race (click on the image to enlarge it):

EV13

And, fully explaining why my mother’s family cannot stay in one place for more than one generation and often moving more than once within one generation, her direct paternal line, YDNA haplogroup R-BY75993, using the Big-Y-documented haplogroup of her brother, back to the earliest male ancestors of the human race (click on the image to enlarge it):

BigY

Definitely cool stuff…


Cite/link to this post: Judy G. Russell, “Tracking back…,” The Legal Genealogist (https://www.legalgenealogist.com/blog : posted 1 August 2021).