AncestryByDNA 3.0
As far an AncestryByDNA is concerned, we know from a previous press release about the scope of this product:
"DNAPrint scientists are collaborating with Dr. Shriver to develop more advanced versions of ANCESTRYbyDNA that may be useful for discerning regional heritage proportions in individuals. For example, ANCESTRYbyDNA 3.0 is expected to be capable in the near future of determining whether an individual is of Irish/British, Middle European (French, German), Scandinavian, Mediterranean (Italian, Greek, Spanish) or Eastern European heritage as well as of Western/Central versus East African heritage or of Japanese, Chinese or Korean heritage."
There are some comments by Tony Frudakis, and others, that appeared on the RootsWeb threads about AncestryByDNA 3.0 in April that tell us a little more about the product:
Yesterday you made a number of references to the Version 3.0 of the DNAPrint test; and similarly there is mention of it in the FAQ section of your website. If it possible at this point to reveal to us what is in the works - in other words what will this test do that Version 2.0 cannot? For example, will it differentiate between European populations and those from, say, Pakistan? Will you be able to separate Koreans from Polynesians or will the latter remain with their "parental stock"? Are there any "ancestral informative markers" that could differentiate between Italians (i.e., Mediterranean populations) from Norwegians (i.e., Nordic populations). I am sure that I can come up with a lot more questions, but the bottom line is, what are you able to say about the new version of the test at present?
Yes, that is the end goal - intracontinental resolution. Chinese from Japanese among East Asians for example, or Scandinavian from Mediterranean from Indo-Pakistani for example within the IndoEuropean group.
Ancestrybydna 3.0 would need to be a DNA chip based product.
3.0 will be able to resolve between intracontinental groups, such as Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Pacific Islander etc. within the East Asian group. A much larger collection of markers will be needed to do this and the test will necessarily be more expensive. We know these markers exist, and we know a reasonable test can be developed to do this, we just havent finished the work yet but we are working on it. Given the larger number of markers that need to be screened from the genome, a DNA chip based approach is needed which is similar to the approach we now use, but we can cover more ground in a shorter period of time with the chip. Its a technical thing - dont worry about it. Suffice it to say, we need to screen much more of the genome to find these rare markers...
Basically, the allele frequencies for some of the Japanese vs. Chinese markers will he high, and for others low. Finding these markers among the 30,000 or so Ancestry Informative Markers in the human genome is the challenge we at DNAPrint face, but once they are found, they will work exactly as the current set do.
BTW, I notice that Tony has stopped subscribing to the RootsWeb threads. I must say I do not blame him. There are some nonsensical converations there about the Ancestry test, some axes being well and truly ground, and pretty obvious agendas from some of the regular (dare I say, to borrow a word, "purist") contributors. Here are a couple of interesting quotes from Tony:
Nonetheless there will probably be a "wrong" result reported on some board like this, or in one of the more left leaning newspapers somewhere in the country. How? There is a contingent of "scientists" who are more politicians than scientists, and who do not practice pan-genome screening, who feel our test is immoral and politically unwise, so do not be surprised if one of them "takes" the test and "reports" completely bogus answers. The reason that this is just going to be a matter of time is that some of these people have already said things in the media (to PBS) that are not direct lies but that are very clear attempts to obfuscate the fact that biogeographical ancestry is written in the DNA - they know it is but they do not want tests like ours being sold so to them the means (lying) justifies the end (what they think will be more harmony and world peace) . If they will lie on TV to the American Public, they will lie to make their point.
Anyone that says our results are not accurate for minor ancestry either continues to fail to understand the mathematical and molecular biological foundation of the test or does not want to understand. Possibly, there is a personal agenda that is being tended to. A test dealing with "race" is sure to stir up the activist in some people...." For example, if ours was a test for tuberculosis that was accurate for detecting low levels of TB within a few percent, would there be so much obstinance from people to accept the results from such a test? No. It would be used, and used to the benefit of those it was used on! It is simply because this test deals with race that people (some from exceedingly "activist" oriented colleges or places) refuse to accept our test.
