By Ricardo Gαndara
AMERICAN-STATESMAN
STAFF
Sunday, October 08, 2006
Carla Nickerson knew she had a thing about
Ghana. For the past eight years, she has traveled to the African country
including on her honeymoon because she felt drawn there. With each succeeding
visit, she felt more and more of a blood connection.
On one of her trips, she toured a castle
in Cape Coast, where African Americans were imprisoned while awaiting transport
during the transatlantic slave trade that spanned the 16th to 19th centuries.
"I was in the men's quarters, a dark,
stone room about 60 by 80 feet with tiny windows. It seemed that I heard and smelled
things. I had a meltdown. I really felt that a male ancestor had been
there," Nickerson recalls.
Now, she's sure some of her ancestors are,
indeed, Ghanaians. According to the results of a home DNA test, her father,
Leon Nickerson, shares "paternal genetic ancestry" with the Ewe and
Akan peoples of Ghana. DNA is the material in our cells that contains the
genetic information passed down from parents to children.
On her mother Verdell's side, she shares
ancestry with the Tikar people of Cameroon, another African country. At least,
that's what it says on the "certificate of ancestry" from African
Ancestry Inc., a Washington, D.C.-based company that specializes in helping
African Americans learn whether their DNA matches that of present-day people
living in Africa.
DNA testing is the latest tool taken up by
Americans seeking an answer to the universal question: Who am I? The technology
is being used to fill the gaps left by searches of genealogical records
(births, deaths, marriages and the like). It's especially useful for African
Americans, whose past is often difficult to trace because of the upheavals of
slavery, and for adoptees with little knowledge of their birth families.
DNA home tests, which became available in 2000,
cost as little as $100 and as much as $1,000 for more extensive analysis. But
detractors say that the results might not be all that useful in pinpointing
geographic origin. Comparing your DNA with that of people somewhere else in the
world today only reveals whether your genetic sequences (called markers) match
up not where those people (and hence, your long-ago relatives) originally
came from.
Nickerson doesn't care. She knows at least
part of her past.
"When I opened the envelope and saw
our DNA matched the Ewe and Akan peoples, I said, 'I know those people. I know
that culture,' " she says. An actor and an artist, she has decorated her
home off East 12th Street with musical instruments, masks, sculptures and other
artwork from Ghana.
Nickerson is one of more than 7,000
customers 95 percent of them African Americans who've used African Ancestry
to test their DNA. Clients' samples are compared with a database of 25,000 DNA
samples from 400 indigenous African groups collected over the past 12 years,
mostly from west and central Africa, says Gina Paige, president and co-founder
of the company. She says African Ancestry tested 1,000 people in 2003, its
first year, and three times that many in 2005.
"They take the tests because they
know little about their family history," says Deborah Bolnick, a
geneticist and lecturer in the department of anthropology at the University of
Texas. "With the DNA test, they get a certificate telling them what
populations in the world contain people with identical DNA sequences. That's at
least a start for them."
African Ancestry sends DNA samples, which
are collected from mouth swabs included in its home test kits, to Sorenson
Genomics LLC, a laboratory in Utah where scientists extract and sequence the
DNA. Each sample is compared with its database of African DNA samples. If an
African match is found, customers get a certificate saying they share genetic
ancestry with groups of people in specific areas of Africa; if there is no
African match, the certificate states which other population group shares
ancestry with the sample. Customers get results in about six weeks.
Several other companies offer the same
testing to help people establish blood lines. Family Tree DNA of Houston was
the first American company to offer the service and has tested 70,000 people
since 2000, says company president Bennett Greenspan. The company also tests
for Native American and Jewish ancestry. People can even test for ties to
Genghis Khan, the notorious ruler and founder of the Mongol Empire, whose sons
spread their Y chromosomes across Central Asia. To date, no Western European or
North American male has matched the DNA profile of Khan, according to Family
Tree DNA's Web site.
"DNA testing helps you get to your
roots faster. It won't hand you your family tree," says Megan Smolenyak,
genealogist and co-author of the book "Trace Your Roots With DNA: Using
Genetic Tests to Explore Your Family Tree." She adds, "It's a
matchmaking game, matching DNA with other people."
African Ancestry also got a boost earlier
this year when it was used in the PBS documentary "African American
Lives" to test prominent people such as host Henry Louis Gates, Jr.,
chairman of African and African-American Studies at Harvard University, and
Oprah Winfrey. In July, Gates was inducted into the predominantly white Sons of
the American Revolution after testing revealed that one of his ancestors was a
free mulatto who fought in the Revolutionary War.
Finding relatives
The popular use of DNA testing coincides
with a growing database of DNA samples worldwide. The National Geographic
Society started The Genographic Project, a five-year research effort to collect
DNA samples from throughout the world, to determine where people originated and
how people got to where they are today. For $100, anyone can participate in the
project by getting a cheek swab home test to determine mitochondrial DNA
(passed down from mother to child, revealing maternal ancestry) or the Y
chromosome test (passed down the male line from father to son).
The information revealed by the tests
attracts genealogy buffs such as Nickerson, Joe Hood and Leo Little, all of
Austin. Hood and Little have spent years researching their families and have
traced their relatives through historical records. Tests from Family Tree DNA
of Houston, however, helped them dig deeper in their families' histories by
identifying distant relatives whose DNA matches theirs.
Little, a semi-retired electrical
engineer, has been researching his family since 1960. When he posted a message
on a www.ancestry.com bulletin board, a Dallas man with the same last name
responded. Leo Little convinced him to take a DNA test; they matched on 36 of
the 37 markers.
Family Tree DNA gives people the option of
releasing contact information to others who are a similar DNA match; through
the company, the Littles learned of 80 others sharing the same last name from
throughout the U.S., Canada, Great Britain, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Among the various Littles was a group from
North Carolina and Tennessee. "We
pooled all of our research," says Leo Little. "It was like pieces of
a puzzle. As it turns out, we descended from Abraham Little, who lived in
Virginia in 1695. It was very exciting."
Hood assumed his mother's role as chief
family researcher and learned through records and DNA testing that he descended
from Enoch Hood, born in 1784 in Virginia. Hood made the connection when he
found a man named Clyde Hood of Missouri through online research. Their DNA
matched on 36 of 37 markers.
In his research, Hood also learned of
another relative (he refused to name him to protect his privacy), whose
great-great-great-great-grandmother lived next to Enoch Hood. Hood believes Enoch
Hood, who was married, had a child with his neighbor. "I have the odd
status of having a picture of this woman who was my third great-grandfather's
girlfriend. We also know she lived to be 104," Joe Hood says.
DNA not an identity
How reliable are DNA tests in answering
the "Who am I?" question? The answer depends on who's talking.
Nickerson, for one, has few doubts.
Bolnick, the geneticist at UT, has her
doubts. She believes that DNA patterns that exist in the world today might not
be reliable when it comes to figuring out an individual's ancient origins.
"DNA tests can tell you where some of
your relatives live today but not where they lived thousands of years ago.
People moved a lot," Bolnick says. Not only that, she says comparing DNA
to present-day people belonging to certain ethnic groups can be misleading.
"The problem with that is that there
is no clear-cut connection between DNA and ethnicity. With these tests, you may
identify groups that some close relatives belong to today, but you may also be
closely related to people in other groups, or in other parts of the world that
you may not know about because their DNA samples have not yet been
studied," Bolnick says. "I just think that some conclusions are
premature."
Paige of African Ancestry says consumers
are told only whether they share a connection with present-day people living in
Africa. "We are clear. We can't tell them ancestry of every lineage. But,
for people who know nothing, knowing one lineage is very important information,"
she says.
Another caveat to DNA testing: People
might not like what they find. Thirty percent of those tested by African
Ancestry to determine their African lineage prove to have European ancestry on
their paternal side, says Paige. (Historians have long contended that white
slave owners impregnated large numbers of black slaves.) However, nearly all
maternal tests done by blacks find African roots.
Bolnick agrees that DNA can reveal
valuable information in many cases. "When people are researching surnames,
DNA tests can be useful because they can either confirm or not prove if they're
related to someone. For African Americans and others, like adoptees, who may
know nothing about their distant ancestors, the tests can tell them where some
of their relatives live around the world," she says.
Nickerson is satisfied with her findings:
"I feel very confident in the way African Ancestry does its cataloging and
sampling. I believe in my heart the results are true."
Besides, in Ghana she sees people who look
like her. "It just feels right," she says.
How to test your DNA
Visit the Web site of any DNA testing
company, such as Family Tree DNA in Houston (www.familytreedna.com), to read
about the different types of tests, check prices and buy a mail-order testing
kit. If you call Family Tree DNA, (713) 868-1438, a representative will help
you choose the right test.
The
test will arrive through the mail, with instructions in several languages.
Family Tree DNA's prices range from the $149 for the Y-Chromosome (paternal
lineage) 12-marker test to $995 for the Super DNA test that includes both
paternal and maternal lineage.
Kit
contains three cotton swabs and three collection tubes. Scrape the inside of your
cheek with the swab and deposit the 'cheek cells' into the tubes.
If
you sign a release form, you give the company consent to share your name and
e-mail address with others who have a similar genetic fingerprint.
Mail the samples in an
envelope provided. You will receive results in four to six weeks.