To: pike-dna@rootsweb.com
Date: Mon, 16 Apr 2007 22:46:46 -0230 (NDT)
From: dapike@math.mun.ca (David Pike)
Subject: [PIKE-DNA] two new results


Hi everybody.

In the past week or two a couple of new test results came back
from the lab, so I want to convey what they ended up showing.
Before discussing these latest results though, I want to bring
to everybody's attention the addition of a map to our project's
"Results" page at:
http://www.math.mun.ca/~dapike/family_history/pike/DNA/index.php?content=results.html
It provides a summary at a glance of where we have observed various
Pike clans in the British Isles... each pushpin colour represents a
genetically distinct Pike family group.  Our project's large "Group 1"
is currently the most prominent on this map, as we know that members
of this family have been in a number of different parishes.

It's an understatement that his map is incomplete, given that there
are plenty of Pike lines in the British Isles that have not yet
gotten involved in our project.  But this is changing... there's a
white pushpin in the map for a result that is currently pending,
plus there are several pushpins not yet shown (for people who have
recently joined the project, as well as for a few that have not sent
in details of just where in the British Isles their Pike lines
originated).

Back now to our latest DNA results, the most recent is for Bradley
(kit 85494) whose DNA results did not clearly match with anybody in
our project.  They are, however, a close match to the rather common
genetic signature known as the WAMH (Western/Atlantic Modal Haplotype).
We've mentioned this before, but I was recently inspired with a new
analogy for explaining markers, and this is a good opportunity to
convey it here.

Y-DNA genetic signatures are passed from father to son, usually intact
but occasionally a mutation might affect a marker or two.  The result
is that all the Pike men in an extended Pike family group will have
very similar genetic signatures, which is precisely what we are honing
in on to try to sort out which family is which.  However, 12-marker
signatures are pretty basic ... as an analogy in which we compare
genetic signatures with hereditary Scottish clan tartans, a 12-marker
signature is kind of like knowing what colours are in your family's
tartan, but not really being aware of other features of the tartan,
such as the precise shades and hues of the colours in use, how these
colours are arranged within the tartan, the nature of the weave, etc.
Knowing only the colours in use means that we end up "matching" with
lots of other folks whose tartans are different but which happen to
also use the same colours.  This is especially true for many of us in
the Y-DNA haplogroups of "R1b" or "I", for which we often find lots
of 12-marker matches that do not involve the Pike surname.  With
additional markers (be it 25, 37, or 67), additional details about
our "genetic tartan" so to speak are revealed, and we become better
able to distinguish it from tartan patterns for other clans that
really aren't related to us... for instance, 25 markers might be
like knowing that it's really navy blue and olive green that are in
our tartan (whereas with 12 markers all we knew was "blue" and "green",
which could have shown a match with a fellow whose tartan contained
both a light sky blue and forest green).  Knowing very fine details
about the knit and weave of the tartan will ultimately distinguish
it from others that might at first glance appear to be similar... this
too is the case with our Y-DNA, for which 37 or 67 markers narrow down
our genetic signatures to just our own Pike clan.

Back to Bradley, while he has several close 12-marker matches within
our project, each of these was revealed to be unlikely to be a match
when the additional information known from 25 markers is taken into
account.  There were also several very obvious non-matches, which will
help to steer future research away from trying to establish connections
between Pike families that we now know are not of the same line.

The other result to come back from the lab recently is for Russell
(kit 83604), who has a genealogy that goes back at least as far as
a Nathaniel Pike in the early 1700s.  There has been some speculation
that Nathaniel might be a grandson of James & Naomi Pike who resided
at Charlestown and Reading, Massachusetts, in the 1640s, but this was
not certain.  At this point, it seems to still be not quite certain.
The family of James & Naomi Pike is shown on our project's "Results"
page as "Group 6".  Including Russell, we now have DNA results for 3
people who descend from James, one each from 3 of his sons.  However,
these DNA results do not agree with one another.  This first came to
our attention when DNA results for a cousin of Jean (kit 61292) came
back as a mis-match with those of Gilbert (kit 62731).  Russell is
also a definite mis-match with Gilbert, but as yet it is tough to
be sure whether Russell and Jean are also a mis-match... we can only
do a 12-marker comparison, for which we find 3 differences.  These 3
differences between their genetic signatures are enough to doubt that
they match, but 3 is also small enough to be within the realm of
possibility for people who are supposed to be 8th cousins twice removed
(indeed, looking at our project's "Group 1", we can find examples of
distant cousins who have a few differences within their first 12 markers,
but whose extended genetic signatures confirm that they are indeed cousins).

So at this point we have two, or possibly three, different genetic
signatures within the family of James & Naomi Pike.  What this in
effect means is that something is not as we would expect, since we
would expect all of James' direct male descendants to match one
another.  There are a number of possible explanations for our
present situation, one of which is that there might be an error
in somebody's genealogy.  Another that is quite possible is that
there has been an unreported adoption in somebody's family line,
in which case we are still looking at the correct family but
somewhere along the way a DNA signature that wasn't originally
"Pike" by name took on the Pike name.  In order to learn more about
what the reality of this situation is, we will need to obtain more
DNA results from various other Pikes from throughout this family
tree.

Meanwhile, however, there was an unexpected surprise that came with
Russell's results:  he was a definite match with the two people who
had been in our project's "Group 4", namely Stuart (our project's
co-admin) and Ronald (kit 34964).  On 37 markers, Russell and Stuart
match on 35 markers.  The irony of this situation is that between
Ronald, Stuart, and Russell, no two of them are yet able to figure
out _how_ they are related to each other, although the hunt is
definitely on.

- David.