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Tuesday, January 22nd, 2019

Twins get some ‘mystifying’ results when they put 5 DNA ancestry kits to the test

Author:     Charlsie Agro and Luke Denne
Source:     CBC (Canada)
Publication Date:     Jan 18, 2019 4:00 AM ET
 Link: Twins get some ‘mystifying’ results when they put 5 DNA ancestry kits to the test
Stephan:   DNA profiling to get your family history is the new hot thing. The problem is what you get may be bogus. On what evidence do I say this? Read this story. Buyer beware.

Marketplace host Charlsie Agro, left, and her identical twin sister, Carly, check out some DNA ancestry results.
Credit: CBC

One set of identical twins, two different ancestry profiles.

At least that’s the suggestion from one of the world’s largest ancestry DNA testing companies.

Last spring, Marketplace host Charlsie Agro and her twin sister, Carly, bought home kits from AncestryDNA, MyHeritage, 23andMe, FamilyTreeDNA and Living DNA, and mailed samples of their DNA to each company for analysis.

Despite having virtually identical DNA, the twins did not receive matching results from any of the companies.

In most cases, the results from the same company traced each sister’s ancestry to the same parts of the world — albeit by varying percentages.

But the results from California-based 23andMe seemed to suggest each twin had unique twists in their ancestry composition.

According to 23andMe’s findings, Charlsie has nearly 10 per cent less “broadly European” ancestry than Carly. She also has French and German ancestry (2.6 per cent) that her sister doesn’t share.

The identical twins also apparently have different […]

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1 Comment

  1. Rev. Dean on Tuesday, January 22, 2019 at 5:35 am

    I read about a gentleman who submitted his DNA to three different companies to trace his ancestry. He ended up with three totally different results, none even close to each other, as far as his actual history of his family. Luckily his family had meticulous records that proved to him that all three of the tests were totally bogus and had no relationship to his real history his family had recorded. Now he wishes he did not waste his money on the tests.