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From: Dienekes Pontikos <>
Subject: Re: [DNA] How old is Y-Chromosome Adam?
Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2011 01:13:51 +0200
References: <201101040808.p0488xgP020485@mail.rootsweb.com><AA814106-788F-475B-9494-D839E21F7AC6@vizachero.com><AANLkTi=FN3NEtEsp93qpYyLSr_tD9PLJb+pRZm+HHpv7@mail.gmail.com><00e301cbac30$3bb02b80$c2482dae@Ken1><AANLkTikw0bwRedjAOMqFXGJ73jEmh-pXOuLfKQENrB77@mail.gmail.com><010e01cbac34$c3983480$c2482dae@Ken1><AANLkTimhrGmoUa=attiP4TkQxa73QJK9-vVdvoM2free@mail.gmail.com><019b01cbac57$659e0c60$c2482dae@Ken1><AANLkTikJRLQ3ahx+4Hvbe2m-W7stiT61ZXbVGpafQpiZ@mail.gmail.com><023701cbac63$48c06820$c2482dae@Ken1>
In-Reply-To: <023701cbac63$48c06820$c2482dae@Ken1>


Not sure how you're getting those estimates, or if in what sense they
are better than Ballantyne's, but thanks for the effort.

I'll leave the subject by noting that for the slowest marker Ken's
method gives a 45% faster rate, hence most of the ~20-fold difference
in the age estimates of "Adam" when one uses the 10 slowest/10 fastest
markers cannot be explained by the postulated underestimation of the
mutation rate of slow markers.

On Wed, Jan 5, 2011 at 1:01 AM, Ken Nordtvedt <> wrote:
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Dienekes Pontikos" <>
>
>
> Ok, it will be interesting to see how you would modify the Ballantyne
> et al. rates if you used the average instead of the median.
> That way we can see how important the difference is, and how it varies
> for markers of different mutability.
>
> For example:
>
> DYS436: 0 mutations in 1798 meioses,estimated at 3.84x10-4
> I'd add (1-.69)/1798 to his number to get 5.56 10^-4 = 1/1798
>
> DYS594: 1 mutation in 1635 meioses, estimated at 1.03x10-3
> I'd get 2/1635 = 1.22 10^-3
>
> DYS576: 24 mutations in 1727 meioses, estimated at 1.43x10-2
> I'd get 25/1727 = 1.448 10^-2
>
> The differences in each case are all of order .3 / 1700, while the
> fractional differences of course diminish with increasing mutability.
>
> I hope playing around with Ballantyne rates is just for convenient example?
> Using only N=1700 or so father/son transitions in his observations, he will
> have  larger statistical uncertainties in estimated rates than those studies
> which use about 10,000 father/son transitions.  It is more difficult to
> determine the true "N" for other methods.
>
> Has someone put the Ballantyne rates up next to other rates commonly used by
> people?  In other words; are there any statistically significant
> discrepancies?  I have a few suspect STRs in mind whose quoted rates I
> doubt.
>
>
>
>
> -------------------------------
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--
Dienekes' Anthropology Blog: http://dienekes.blogspot.com
Dodecad Ancestry Project: http://dodecad.blogspot.com

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