DNA Matches, How do you spread your sheet?

Question

Hey Gang,

I am working on DNA help for the (new) Adoption Angels Project.

As a part of this I am trying to put together a SIMPLE DNA cheat sheet of information on DNA and how it can be used as a tool to help people with adoptions in their family to identify relatives.

You can see it here. (IF you find mistakes please feel free to correct my work - Peter my hero) It's a work in progress.

I know what I have been scrapping together via spreadsheets, Free Space Sandboxes and my Profile page to help others find information about my family, what have you been using to sort out your DNA and Matches and how? I plan to steal your ideas to add to this page and hopefully help some people find out who they are.

Mags (now with 11 adoptees who match me genetically)

Answer 1

I recommend DNAGedcom.com in addition to Genome Mate. It helps you identify triangulated matches from Gedmatch and FTDNA.  I find it to be the easiest site to get a visual on triangulated groups.  The combination of Genome Mate , Gedmatch, and DNAGedcom is unbeatable for helping identify and track your segments and matches.

Comments

Stolen and added to the page! Thanks Darlene! Mags

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Actually, its best to import your data from DNA gedcom to genome mate pro.  It works better that way!  I import data from DNA gedcom, gedmatch, 529andYou and the Ancestry DNA Helper.  I'm only new at it but it has made a big difference to my DNA life!

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I would also suggest that you recommend people set up an email address specifically to use for contacting people regarding their DNA. Gmail offers free accounts, as do others. Set up the email before you order any tests. Then use it for the testing sites as well as registering with Gedmatch and other reporting sites.  This allows you to maintain anonymity as well as allowing you an easier way to keep your DNA emails separate from your primary personal email.

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Thank you both! Mags

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Darlene, how can DNAGedcom help you in triangulating via GEDmatch data? AFAIK triangulation is only possible for paid accounts at GEDmatch and then only for the top 200 triangulated matches.

Did I overlook something? I would be interested how you "identify triangulated matches for GEDmatch".

Same is true for FTDNA. You can download the ICW data from FTDNA, I agree with that, but that's not triangulation (you're missing at which chromosome and start/end position match B and match C are matching each other). ICW doesn't mean triangulation (matching A, B and C at the same chr with overlapping chromosomes).

So what you wrote is not possible in both cases (or maybe in the case of GEDmatch the first 200 triangulated matches are being downloaded / copy&pasted into DNAGedcom but then again only for paid accounts).

Please don't take my questions personally, I just want to avoid that we're putting wrong information in a paper that is distributed to many DNA genealogists. But then again I could be wrong ;-)

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Hey Andrea and thanks for being tenacious about what goes into this page. Looking forward to this discussion fleshing out the right information to post. AND yes this is the finer side of collaboration.  Mags

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Andreas, you are correct that you have to pay for the Tier 1 level at Gedmatch in order to get triangulated matches.  You then import those into DNAGedcom and then can use their ADSA (Autosomal DNA Segment Analyzer) which will enable you to 'see' the segments shared with others.   This page tells you all about ADSA and shows you samples of the charts that will allow you to identify triangulated groups from your ICW matches in Gedmatch and FTDNA:  https://www.dnagedcom.com/adsa/adsamanual.html.php

You can also load your FTDNA file into DNAGedcom and, again, use their ADSA to see which segments a group of people is sharing -- thus the triangulation in a 'visual' (which I find to be very helpful).

You can read about it here:  https://www.dnagedcom.com/adsa/Index.php

I many times will copy the visual color chart that ADSA produces and include it in the email I send to the groups of people that are part of a triangulated group to allow them to see the shared matches.  This isn't  exclusively 'in common with'...  With the ADSA, you can look and see whether the people that match you also match one another.  Thus by using this tool at DNAGedcom, you can see if the ICW people from FTDNA actually match one another and form a triangulated group.  It's a great tool, and I highly recommend it.

Bottom line is that it IS possible to do what I stated -- which is to identify triangulated groups from your data at Gedmatch and FTDNA using DNAGedcom.

Forgive me if it takes me awhile to respond to questions/posts.  I'm currently on holiday in New Zealand and am out having fun in the sun.  This morning I went swimming with the dolphins!!

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Hi Darlene,

please continue to enjoy your NZ adventure & holiday. I've written a separate thread that clarifies my original statement that ICW and triangulation is not the same and that the ADSA tool cannot do triangulation with FTDNA data (due to the lack of segment specific information not shared for all individuals by FTDNA).

Again, please do not see this as a personal offense, I want to avoid that something that is already been repeated over and over on the internet is now being put into a document that even more people will (hopefully) read.

You can find the thread here and your comments are welcome as always: http://www.wikitree.com/g2g/201861/icw-in-common-with-is-not-equal-to-triangulation

 

I'm not sure if you and others are also a member of Rootsweb DNA Genealogy mailing list. If not, I would strongly recommend to join it as it's the best place to discuss such topics with many experts like Dr. Tim Janzen, Jim Bartlett, Roberta Estes and others.

Oh and we agree that it's possible to visualize the first 200 triangulated matches that are downloaded if one has a paid account from the tier 1 of GEDmatch via the ADSA tool.

But I have to disagree as well with the statement that ADSA tool enables you to do triangulation. The ADSA tool isn't doing the triangulation, as that detailed segment data isn't revealed on one single page at GEDmatch (one has to perform many One-to-One manually to do the triangulation). GEDmatch is doing the triangulation and it's the only place where you currently can do that besides via the FI:A tool at 23andme.

Hope this clarifies

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Andreas, it is very wrong of you to state (in your other post and inferred here) that I referred to ICW and triangulation as being one and the same thing.  I, in no uncertain terms, did not and have never referred to ICW and triangulation as being the same.  Please don't put words into my mouth...

I am not a newbie with DNA.  I tested my father's mtDNA almost ten years ago and have had an ongoing interest in DNA ever since.  Shortly thereafter I tested his Y-DNA and then his auDNA almost two years ago.  I have been researching, analyzing and mapping my chromosomes ever since. 

I work diligently to help others get interested in and understand DNA, making them aware that ICW (in common with) means that the profile person and another person share other people as matches, and that triangulation is when the profile person and two or more others share a segment on a specific chromosome.

I will again reiterate that, if you're tested with FTDNA, you can upload your raw data to DNAGedcom.  You then can use their ADSA tool to help identify triangulated groups.  Yes, you have to analyze what you're seeing in the charts.  But it's a very good visual aid.  And if you are a Tier 1 member at Gedmatch, you can take the information from there and upload it to DNAGedcom:  https://www.dnagedcom.com/docs/GEDmatchADSA.pdf

I am indeed a member of the rootsweb group you mention and have been in email contact in the past with a couple of the experts you mentioned.  One of my cousins, Whit Athey, is also a DNA expert, having developed the Y-haplogroup predictor that is still used today.  You can read about Whit here:  http://www.molgen.org/rjgg/index.php/RJGG/article/viewFile/22/16 ,

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Dear Darlene, I've corrected my statement about you using "ICW and triangulation in the same sense" and responded also to all other points raised by you in detail.

The thread is here: http://www.wikitree.com/g2g/201861/icw-in-common-with-is-not-equal-to-triangulation

You're still wrong about anyone being able to do triangulation with the data that FTDNA provides us with. You can only do so if you download your raw DNA data (which BTW isn't uploaded to DNAGedcom again as you mix up) to GEDmatch or to any other site that allows to compare raw DNA data.

Raw DNA data doesn't refer to your matches, segment information or ICW (as you wrote it), it refers to the raw (meaning non aggregated, in it's pure form) DNA data of our SNP's that were tested at the DTC DNA testing companies. Raw and aggregated data are two completely different things.

Raw DNA data (information about tested SNP's) allows for health related interpretation of the DNA and for identifying matches. Aggregated data in the form of matching segments, their corresponding start, end position, genetic distance and number of matching SNP's is providing the necessary privacy layer to protect the kit owner from revealing any health related information.

Hope this clarifies and we can put our dispute to rest and move on to more important things, like our hobby for example.

Answer 2

1. Do the course at www.dnaadoption.com

2.  Build your own 'likely' trees as much as you can working with genetic matches until you can identify some common genetic ancestors.

3. Try www.genomemate.com - new 'genome mate pro' to plot the chromosomes, have a profile for each person.  You can import data from all the key sites into one place, no need to access multiple sites all the time.

Comments

Thanks Veronica! Stolen and used.

Mags

Answer 3

You might want to take a look at the "Methodology" on DNAAdoption.  It's about as simple as you can get when it comes to DNA analysis.

Go to http://www.dnaadoption.com.  Select the "Getting Started" tab.  On the left you will see a list.  Select "The Methodology".

On page 5, the Methodology also explains how DNAGedcom can help with triangulation.

In a nutshell:
1. Find your closest matches.
2. Find who they are in common with (ICW), AND if they also match each other on those overlapping segments. (Remember that there are 2 sides to a chromosome so some of these ICWs may be maternal and some paternal).
3. Work the ancestral trees of those overlapping AND matching ICWs (both linearly and laterally) to find their common ancestor.
4. Somewhere in the descendants of that common ancestor will be your family also.

Karin Corbeil

Comments

Thanks Karin! I am stealing this and running to look at the DNAAdoption getting started page. I love nutshells! Mags

Answer 4

Mags,

 

I have some comments on your page. First of all it's covering most that is important for DNA (and adoptees). I thought that a couple of pictures would help, I know there are some posted eg in Dr. Tim Janzen's presentation on what DNA is (to find at ISOGG wiki). Then there is the excellent one that Don Worth posted in DNA Newbie list on Facebook, it shows how far atDNA, Y-DNA and mtDNA test usually go.

As they say a picture says more than a thousand words. I could post those that I like here but I'm not sure if they are all free of rights (not even sure where those that posted it are the original authors). Please email me otherwise and I'll send them over to you.

I think this paragraph needs more clarification:

"Tier 1 Utilities - For a one-time donation of any amount, or the 'Join GEDmatch' button to establish a recurring $10 per month amount. Will give you the following Utilities:"

Question: Isn't it that you have to pay $10 to get one month of Tier 1 access? I haven't used it until now (not enough time to do genealogy as usual) so some others who have might comment.

In general it's a bit too thin to give GEDmatch enough credit. There is a lot of things you can do with the free version which isn't mentioned here. Triangulation can be done manually but I do understand that the tools on GEDmatch are overwhelming even to more experienced users sometimes. Admixture isn't mentioned, surely one thing that adoptees are interested in (I know it's an estimation but adoptees are looking for every straw to define themselves and their roots).

Not so sure about DNA.Land. It's still very small and I can't imagine that people only upload to the much smaller version of DNA.Land when GEDmatch has 200k+ kits to offer to match against. So that only doubles and might not give new results. Maybe you can reflect that as nothing is worse than expectations that aren't met.

Triangulation:

It's unfortunately a bit misleading, if not wrong. In your triangle example you're missing C, only when A,B and C have overlapping, matching segments at the same chromosome it's a triangulation. So please add that A needs to match C and B needs to match C as well (with the above condition which you explain in the text below the triangle).

The part about the top of the triangle is the MRCA is something I don't understand. It's the most difficult task to find a MRCA, not even speaking of a CA (common ancestor). The MRCA is correct in such that there is one for A and B. But there are other MRCA's (they could be all the same which would make the MRCA the CA but I never had that) as well, the one that A and C are both related to, same for B and C. Those are missing.

The CA is the couple (very important, many people get that wrong and think that MRCA and CA is a single person, it's always a couple) where A, B and C are related from. Usually it's different branches through two siblings (their children) and then later it spreads further through two more siblings. Again, a picture would say more than a thousand words illustrating MRCA, CA and such.

As for your "in simpler terms" list, I have written about how misleading ICW is. I wouldn't use it as FTDNA isn't giving the required data away and people would had to ask their matches anyway. On Ancestry is even worse, even if the person would answer no one knows where they match.

So triangulation down to two places only (that info is missing here as well), 23andme (amongst their own testers only!) and GEDmatch. When you're doing it manual at GEDmatch you don't need ICW, actually you can't even find the term "ICW" being used on GEDmatch at all (it's a FTDNA term, also not used at 23andme - not sure about AncestryDNA though). Again, it's all about managing expectations. Newbies might spend days trying to figure out how trees match at FTDNA as they think an ICW is their relative where in reality sometimes it's not. That's discouraging to say the least. For adoptees it's best to concentrate first on GEDmatch and spend time there, only when they are done with all their 1500 matches shown they should move to FTDNA (if they tested there). Only exception is good matches over 20cM, those are more promising and to a much higher chance also IBD. 

That's all for now, hope this is helpful Mags! Keep up the good work

Comments

Thanks Andreas, this is just great. I got another critique this morning and I welcome it!

The Pictures you mentioned aren't really any use unless the copyright information is there. You could post the links and I'll see if I can square that away to add them.

Thanks for you critique, it is much appreciated.

Mags