DNAPrint Test Results - East Asian vs Native American Minority Admixture Detection

DNAPrint Test Results - East Asian vs Native American
Minority Admixture Detection
and Version 2.5 versus Version 2.0

A Continuing Part of My DNAPrint Testing Saga

DNAPrint Tests for Full Brothers

Full brothership verified scientifically by a siblingship test
AncestrybyDNA Personal Sample Code Numbers Masked Out for Privacy Reasons.

I was physically sampled and tested twice with the DNAPrint 2.0 test in the spring of 2003. Once with a sample submitted via FamilyTreeDNA and the second time via a sample submitted directly to AncestrybyDNA. I also had my 71 marker genotype table reprocessed/re-scored with the 2004 algorithm this spring. The results for the two tests in the spring of 2003 and the results of the reprocessing/re-scoring of my 71 marker genotype data table in 2004 using the latest 2.0 algorithm were exactly the same, i.e., 79% European and 21% Asian. That was temporarily re-assuring to me. However, as an experiment out of scientific curiousity, I had my full brother tested in June 2004 with the DNAPrint version 2.0 test which was being phased out. I ordered the test to see for the record what his results would be on the 2.0 test. I wanted to have 2.0 results for both of my siblings for my PA Deutsch study. To those of you following my DNAPrint testing history you may remember my 1/2 sister tested last year at 88% European and 12% Asian for the version 2.0 test. Well to all of our surprise my full brother's results came back as 77% European and 23% Native American. His being my full brother was not in doubt to our family but to satisfy the scientists, a siblingship test was done which verified his full siblingship. In addition the previous Y-DNA and mtDNA tests of my brother and I matched exactly. Also my brother and my mtDNA exactly matched our 1/2 sister since we all have the same mother. We brothers are in the common R1b yDNA haplogroup which is of western European origins. And our mtDNA for us and our 1/2 sister is in the equally common H mtDNA haplogroup which is of western European origins. The two diametrically opposite Most Likely Estimate (MLE) calls by the DNAPrint 2.0 test for our non-European, non-African minority and ancient admixture in my opinion clearly demonstrates that the DNAPrint version 2.0 test cannot reliably differentiate between Asian and Native American admixture. Either that or some change was made in the scoring algorithm mechanism between early 2003 and mid-2004 such that the results became more weighted towards reporting certain admixture AIM frequencies as Native American over East Asian admixture. So upon the recommendation of Tony Frudakis we upgraded to the newer 2.5 version of the test. My DNAPrint 2.5 test results were 93% European and 7% Asian. My full brother's DNAPrint 2.5 test results were just received this week, 3 Sep 2004, and his results were 86% European and 14% Native American. Again diametrically opposite of my results in regards to the MLE being Asian for me and Native American for him. Same problem. Note: Whatever the non-European, non-African admixture really is in my brother and I, we have no known Asian or Native American ancestry in our 8-10 generation ancestry chart from 28 years of traditional genealogical research. There is no oral history in our family of any minority ancestry. Our oral history indicates our family is PA Deutsch on all branches. And that has been confirmed by the 28 years of paper trail research back to colonial times immigrants from German speaking areas of Europe to Pennsylvania for my ancestors. Genealogical research has been my major hobby interest most of my adult life. I am always open to new information. But I am quite confident that my traditional family research is solid. It is well documented. So at this point the non-European, non-African admixture (whether it is Asian or Native American) which is being reported in both the version 2.0 and the version 2.5 DNAPrint tests as being in our family genome must be from ancient or very old sources or the descrepancy is a result of flaws in the test algorithms. I report this here for the information of others who may have had confusing results with the version 2.0 (71 pairs of atDNA SNP markers) and/or version 2.5 (175 pairs of atDNA SNP markers) test in regards to separating Asian and Native American results when one or the other was possibly expected in their respective family's test results and instead they got the other result which they did not expect. As I said neither result was expected in our family. Can one imagine the confusion to a person less experienced in genealogical research in getting a result such as these? Or can you imagine if a person got one result from one test and then went off on a wild goose chase looking for something in their Ancestry Chart which may or may not be there? At this point I'm just confused as to what the non-European, non-African content really is. Is it real or not? And if real, is it East Asian or is it Native American ... or a bit of both?

Results for Brother 1 (me)

Results for me/brother 1 for the new Euro 1.0 320/310 Marker Indo-European Assay.

Results for Brother 2

(Important Note: When comparing the triangle plots for brother 1 and brother 2, please note that while at first glance the images
look similar, one must notice that the reference axis were orientated differently by DNAPrint for the plots for brother 2.
With the brother 1 triangle plots the East Asian is on the right. With the brother 2 triangle plots the Native American is on the right.)
Why DNAPrint/AncestrybyDNA did this, I don't know.

[Bro 2 Graph]

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