The Value of a DNA Segment

-

 Hi folks, if you saw my post last week, Wikitree, and the Value of Half-Relatives then you know that I was excited to know that the one DNA segment that my mystery match and I shared was from one shared ancestor, my second great-grandfather Elias Henry Baysinger. 

Elias Henry Baysinger 1832-1900

Elias married three times and had 15 children, one of whom died at birth or within days of birth and is buried in the same grave as my second great-grandmother Sarah who was the second wife and mother of ten. 

My match descends from the third wife, Lydia, so the shared segment comes only from Elias, and from neither wife. 



What can I do with this segment data beyond "painting" it?


Gedmatch Free Tools

The first tool I used was at Gedmatch, called People who match both kits, or 1 of 2 kits, a free tool. I often use this kit to find out who a mystery match is, because as the ungainly title of the tool says, it creates a list of those kits who match both kits. If some recognizable names pop up there, I usually know, at the very least, whether the match is on my father's or mother's side of my tree. 

In this case though, it gave me a list of Baysinger matches and some or all of them will be EH Baysinger matches! Click for the spreadsheet I created from that output; read-only. You can put in the kit numbers into Gedmatch to see what the raw output is like, and from there one can do further processing on the common matches, put them into a Match Group, etc. 


Gedmatch Tier 1 Tools ($)


What seems most useful in this case though is the Segment Search, which has an arrow in the image to the left.

Tier 1 costs $10 for a month, and I think a bit less if you auto-renew, which is what I do. If you don't use Gedmatch often, pay for a month occasionally when you need one of the tools. They are pretty cool, especially the Combine multiple kits into 1 superkit, which I have done. This allows slightly better SNP matching, since each auDNA testing company chooses a slightly different range of SNPs to test. After creating the "superkit" you can set your others for research only so each one will not show up multiple times in your match's searches.


Segment Search ($)

With the segment search, I can winnow the spreadsheet down to those who share the segment of interest. If you learn better from watching a video before trying it out, watch this short Family History Fanatics video first: Searching for Segments on GEDmatch - A Segment of DNA. I re-watched it before linking it here, and although it's two years old, it is still current information. The ancestor projects referred to at the end are growing and thriving, and are 100% free. There are 709 groups now. 


The Process

The match and my uncle share one segment on chromosome 14, from 57,309,063 to 90,451,500, so on the segment search, I asked only for chromo-14 from 57,000,000 to 90,000,000. By rounding off the numbers I hope to catch all the reasonable shared segments. A reminder that each of these matches must still be submitted to a one-to-one match test, to be sure that it truly is the same segment of DNA, and not on the maternal strand rather then the paternal. Remember that although the companies portray our chromosomes as line with segments, in reality it is two strands, one of which we get from our mother, and one from our father. Just because numbers match up does not mean anything unless there is a true match!


Segment Findings

In the graphic part of the output you can see the top large segment which the match shares with my uncle. I wonder if the smaller matches are further up the Baysinger tree. Only genealogy research can answer that question. First, I need to check each kit against my match and my uncle and see if they are a true match - they all are, and many of the larger matches share other segments with the match. I have not yet done a similar one to one with my uncle's kit. The output is saved to a spreadsheet so more analysis can be done. Some kits may have trees or other information which can assist in the search for common ancestors. 

Genealogy work continues!


Valorie Zimmerman


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What's the Question?

-
Image
We genealogists are often told by experienced researchers how important it is to begin with a research question. I resisted doing this for a long time, but now that I use a series of questions to guide my research, the search is more focused and actually finds more of the history of the family I'm investigating. I use a Google Doc as the  research proceeds, where I keep the question(s), the plan, timelines, checklist of resources to search, etc. all in one place. I've seen others use spreadsheets in the same way, perhaps splitting up things in tabs (Excel or Google Sheets). I prefer a document because I add source citations as I find them and I can begin writing up the case right there in the doc as the hypotheses are proven. Specific Questions in Previous Successes As beginners we often have no clue how much and what details we already know about a person, event or relationship, so it's hard to specify what we want to know. But when looking back at successful research, it
Read more

Looking for a Needle in a Haystack? GAME CHANGER at FamilySearch

-
Image
Generated with Bing ImageCreator (AI), March 13, 2024 Where is YOUR Needle, Your Missing Record? Genealogical Proof Standard When we use the GPS (Genealogical Proof Standard) as our guide, we all know that "exhaustive research" can be both tedious and exhausting. Is life long enough to search page by page through all the counties where all the members of a family might have lived, paid taxes, bought, leased or sold property, made a will or died intestate? It is possible that the new Full Text Search at FamilySearch will  eventually  allow us to do just that. It has been estimated that 75% or more of the records at FamilySearch were browsable but not searchable; the only indexes those found in the records themselves. Those records are certainly attainable by using those indexes and browsing to the record of interest, but the process is tedious, often frustrating, and slow. And once found, the record must be read and transcribed to be useful. This new Full Text Search tackles a
Read more

Shedding Your Genealogy "Stuff"

-
Image
AI: Bing Image Creator Generated Changing realities force many of us to consider the future of our genealogical collections. Whether a change in health, a new location or even just downsizing, it can be useful to evaluate what we have now, with an eye to the future. What we can pass along? Plan Ahead First: if you have online trees, create a plan to grant access to interested fellow researchers, even distant cousins. Depending on the website, you may need to add a codicil to your will, or just tell the site whom your successor will be.  Ancestry.com: there are two considerations: your DNA test and your tree(s). It is wise to share your DNA results with a cousin or other relative; no need to wait. Or you can  Assign a Manager .  For overall accounts and trees, there is  Ancestry® Family Plan Memberships .  FamilySearch help file:  How to Connect to a Family Member’s Tree .  B ecause it is a shared tree, a person cannot pass along their FamilySearch account. Ensure that your interested
Read more