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After enthusiastically receiving the ancestry results from my DNA test and uploading them to GEDmatch, I sent away my 23andMe raw data to Dr. Doug McDonald, a former professor at the University of Illinois, for further analysis. This was the result:
Most likely fit is 45.0% (+/- 17.3%) Europe (various subcontinents) and 55.0% (+/- 17.3%) Mideast (various subcontinents).
The following are possible population sets and their fractions, most likely at the top:
Tuscan= 0.547 Cypriot= 0.453
Tuscan= 0.657 Armenian= 0.343
Tuscan= 0.698 Druze= 0.302
French= 0.307 Cypriot= 0.693
English= 0.261 Cypriot= 0.739
Germany= 0.252 Cypriot= 0.748
Italian= 0.430 Cypriot= 0.570
all which is very typical for Greeks. Nothing at all unusual. We don’t have Greeks as comparison panels.
The results were much more surprising than what I had gotten with 23andMe. With this analysis, it showed 55% Middle Eastern and 45% European with a 17.3% margin of error. I wasn’t expecting such a huge jump in Middle Eastern from 15.6% in my 23andMe results.
The possible population sets represent the most probable makeup of my ancestry. All of them make sense except for the French, English, and German.
Map Plot
Dr. McDonald also sent a few images that show some interesting data. First is a map plot indicating the average location of ancestry. A green dot indicates the average location of overall ancestry (Greece). The average location of Middle Eastern ancestry (Cyprus) is indicated by a blue dot. The red dot is the average location of European ancestry (Italy), which if looked at closely seems to be right on top of Venice. This makes a lot of sense to me because my ancestral home of Chios in Greece was for a short time under the rule of the Republic of Venice before being ruled by the Genoese for nearly 250 years. It was also a part of the Roman Empire for a very long time.
Scatter Plot
The next two images show a scatter plot which indicates average ancestry across my entire genome. In both, I show up in Sicily.
Chromosome Segment Painting
The final image shows a color-coded chromosome segment painting. It shows location data for all 22 autosomes and the X chromosome. This is where the percentages of Middle Eastern and European were determined along with the margin of error. There are a couple blue dots indicating Africa, but Dr. McDonald believes this is probably just “noise”.
