Rachel Unkefer has been involved in Jewish genealogy for more than 30 years, specializing in German and Early American families. Her articles on DNA research have appeared in Avotaynu: The International Review of Jewish Genealogy and she is the administrator or co-administrator of several DNA projects at Family Tree DNA, including the Jews of Frankfurt Project, the Bacharach Project, the Suwalki-Lomza Project, the R-FGC20747 Y-Haplogroup Project, and the I2a Y-Haplogroup Project.

“How “Next Generation” Y-DNA Testing Can Reveal the Deeper History of Jewish Lineages” (Thurs-102), 9:00 – 10:15 A.M.

In just the past three years, the field of genealogical genetic testing has advanced from being able to sample the Y-chromosome in a few dozen locations to several million, thanks to “Next Generation Sequencing” (NGS) products like FTDNA’s Big Y and others. Networks of “citizen scientists” have begun mapping out genetic trees that are far more accurate than were ever before possible.

This more extensive and accurate data is particularly useful for Jewish genealogists seeking to link groups of men to their common male ancestor farther back in time than the typical 8-10 generations covered by surnames. Because these new tests are costly and not easy to interpret, many genetic genealogists are not making full use of them.

Using several ongoing Jewish lineage projects as examples (including one cluster of Ashkenazi men who might actually turn out to be from Portugal), we’ll discuss testing strategies and survey available data interpretation tools.

Topics: Ashkenazic research, Sephardic research, DNA research and genetics, Immigration and migration over the ages