Darnall Group DF02

Darnall SNP Tree, R1b-BY125922

• Think of the Y chromosome as a stream that passes through every generation of males, branching into different forks with each son. Much like debris swept along in a river, the end point (the tester) is an archive of all the mutations that proceeded him, just as a small cove collects all that was swept down the river.
  
  
• A SNP mutation is briefly described in this micro lesson.
  
  
• Each alphanumeric designation is rather arbitrarily assigned but does represent a SNP mutation found in the tester's Y chromosome. And each SNP arose at the birth of a specific ancestor, most of whom we will never be identified by name.
  
  
• The SNPs are arranged by groups, known as haplogroups. A haplogroup is defined by multiple testers who share the same SNPs with one another, much like siblings sharing the same parent, or cousins who share the same grandparent. Genetic similarity dovetails with a genealogical relationship; the more similar the genetics, the closer the relationship.
  
  
• And haplogroups are arranged in a timeline, the older haplogroups at the top, the more recently emerged at the bottom of the tree. The continue to climb up three tree and into the past. The oldest known SNPs are about 330,000 years old. The tester can research his SNP tree and see the numerous branches in his account at FTDNA. This is just a small sliver.
  
  
• The SNPs in the light blue box are those that have been found (to date) to belong only to the tester. There are matches out there, they just haven't yet been tested. If a fifth couisin, for example, were to test, he would match the vast majority of the present novel (or private) SNPs.
  
  
• Although the emergence of SNPs is random and will vary from one lineage to the next, it can be reasonably expected that they occur on the average of one per every four generations. The 26 private SNPs listed here, then, might cover about a hundred generations, or about three thousand years. Clearly, there a long way to go before drawing a rather detailed SNP lineage. And, certainly, some of the novel SNPs are well within the genealigical timeframe. In other words, one day some of them might resaonably be identified by name, date, and place.
  
  
• The following page, also maintained by myself, is a moderate example as to how detailed a SNP tree can become — and it's even hindered by a lack of a sufficient number of advanced testing: R1a-YP4248 Subclade Project. Every tester's lineage can be extracted and arranged in the manner at left.
  
  

Y-111 STR Results

There are four testers in Group DF02, two of whom have tested for at least 111 STRs at FTDNA. There is a six-marker difference between them (known as genetic distance or GD), but that's reasonable. But taking these and the SNP results together, we have a fairly good genetic representation for this lineage. However, we need more SNP testing in order to home in on Morgan's exact Y-DNA print.

Additional Information

FTDNA Home of the Darnall / Darnell FTDNA Project
Family Trees Associated with the Darnall Project
1920 Family Profile For Richard Bennett Darnall (1877-1957)