GENEALOGY-DNA-L Archives

Archiver > GENEALOGY-DNA > 2002-02 > 1012772549


From: "Bennett Greenspan" <>
Subject: [DNA] Markers, testing, prices, charts and graphs
Date: Sun, 3 Feb 2002 15:42:38 -0600
In-Reply-To: <2449F3F867FBD211936600C04F68569EA3C799@smhrimsx.mhri.med.umich.edu>


Hi List

A lot of excitement has been generated by the growth of this fledgling
industry within the past 2 short years since FTDNA started offering
Y-DNA tests for Genealogists. As some of you know, I started this
company because, in 1999, I couldn't connect 2 branches of my family.I
needed a service that wasn't available on a commercial basis.

We started with a 12 marker test, because we felt this would be a
sufficient number of markers to answer, for most people, the binary
question surrounding the "are we related" that we genealogists
continually ask. At that time, we decided to hold the DNA on file for
your future use, because we expected that the day would come when there
would be a need to tighten the math to better predict the MRCA.

Based on Dr. Bruce Walsh's suggestion (he is our population geneticist
and serves on our Scientific Advisory Board), we have increased our
number of markers to 21 as he feels that is the area where we're likely
to hit diminishing returns of MRCA related to the price of obtaining the
results. We just posted at our site a graph that clearly shows the
diminishing returns after about 20 markers. From here, to have a real
gain in terms of MRCA, we would have to jump to 40 markers or more.
Currently, the cost of such testing would increase substantially. And
still, we would be talking about a 50% probability.

Speaking of pricing, I'd like to point out that our price for any test
includes 25 years of archiving of your DNA sample (allowing further
upgrades of your DNA if you desire in the future) and lifetime use of
our Database of Recent Ethnic Origins.

Our automatic email notification system for exact 'genetic cousins' will
go live on February 7th, and this too is a lifetime service.

I'm pleased to announce that tomorrow we will be able to release the
additional 9 DYS numbers that comprise our current offering of 21
markers.

While it may appear, at a first glance, that our prices are higher than
our competition, over the course of time we are by far the most cost
effective DNA testing service for genealogists who want to use DNA
testing as a full service tool, since we don't require
subscription fees to continuously provide you with information about new

additions to our databases and consequently, new matches. (Isn't that
what we are really studying?...;-)...)

Yes.... and as always, FTDNA staff and I will be continuously available
to personally answer your questions about your test, interpretation of
the results, or any other genealogy question related to the scope of DNA
testing for genealogical use.

Thank you!

Bennett Greenspan
President

http://www.FamilyTreeDNA.com
"History Unearthed Daily"
The World's only website dedicated to Genealogy by Genetics




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