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Adoptees Sold by Nuns WorldWide

Adoptees Sold by Nuns WorldWide

Nun’s Habits in Spain It started with a whisper in Spain. A Catholic nun was charged for the first time with abducting a baby from an unwed mother which was sold to a childless couple. Sister Maria Gomez Valbuena told the mother that the baby had died at first, later admitting that it had been adopted. There had been whispers before in Quebec in the 1930-1970s with thousands of French Canadian babies being taken from their … Read entire article »

Filed under: Adoptee News

The ABCs of DNA — IBD vs IBS vs mIBC

The ABCs of DNA — IBD vs IBS vs mIBC

IBD vs. IBS When you are matched up to a potential family member at one of the genetic testing services, they do so by finding segments of DNA where the alleles are the same over a minimum distance of both your and your match’s DNA. At least that’s what is supposed to happen. There are several things that can go wrong when matching segments between people and here we’re going to discuss the unfortunate incident of … Read entire article »

Filed under: The Basics

Summary of 23andMe’s New Pricing

Summary of 23andMe’s New Pricing

  Pricing Changes at 23andMe Earlier this week, 23andMe’s CEO, Anne Wojcicki, announced a new pricing scheme and a plan going forward after managing to anger the whole of the genealogical community with their unannounced changes in December. Today, I had the pleasure of talking to Dotti Prazak and Tim Dang from 23andMe and one of the main things I wanted to get clarified about these new changes is the new pricing scheme. As those following the … Read entire article »

Filed under: DNA News

23andMe Responds to Customer Complaints About Rebuilt Forum by Returning Old Functionality!

23andMe Responds to Customer Complaints About Rebuilt Forum by Returning Old Functionality!

Recent Changes Made a Mess of the Forums I don’t know about you, but when the new forum was created over at 23andMe I felt like I was hit over the head with a sandbag! I couldn’t seem to ‘see’ straight. I couldn’t figure out how to find anything and I had a huge headache after hours of trying. I kept trying for a week with no better success. I couldn’t locate new posts and I … Read entire article »

Filed under: DNA News

23andM Reverses Decision, Reaches Out to Alienated Customers

23andM Reverses Decision, Reaches Out to Alienated Customers

In a surprising move, 23andMe reversed its earlier decision to drop relative finder matches for customers which stop subscribing after fulfilling their 1-year commitment. This move was in reaction to the strongly negative reaction of their customer base to their unannounced changes to the TOS. The author was honored to work with other community leaders to communicate the community’s distress to the owner of 23andMe, Anne Wojcicki. I want to express my appreciation to CeCe … Read entire article »

Filed under: DNA News

Breach of Trust at 23andMe

Breach of Trust at 23andMe

Recently, 23andMe has changed their TOS reneging on their promise that, if you’ve paid off your year subscription but don’t want to pay indefinitely, you will not get future matches nor health info but you won’t lose access to the information that you already have including your RF matches and your health reports. Now, should you choose not to continue to pay their subscription fee, it is like you never paid them hundreds of dollars … Read entire article »

Filed under: DNA News

Where to Start on 23andMe — Relative Finder

Welcome Trackers let the DNA Safari begin! By trackers, I mean those following the DNA Footprints that your ancestors left within your body as clues to who you are and where you come from. Adoptees, birth parents and orphans are especially welcome, but anyone on the hunt for their ancestry is welcome — as are constructive comments from anyone. Congrats on taking your first steps along this fascinating road. You’ve made the leap, submitted your sample to 23andMe and your results are rolling in! It’s like the midwinter holiday and your birthday all rolled up in one.  First thing to note is, your Relative Finder results — that’s where you get DNA matches and start searching for your family — don’t populate for you until after they’ve populated for your … Read entire article »

Filed under: 23andMe Guide

The ABCs of DNA — SNPs

The ABCs of DNA — SNPs

  SNPs   There are two main ways that people are genetically different from each other. Either because they have a variation in the sequence of bases along their chromosomes or because they have a different number of copies of a gene. It is the former situation we’ll discuss here, where the SNPs vary. An SNP, pronounced snip, is shorthand for single nulceotide polymorphism. A nucleotide is a genetic base — Adenine (A), Guanine (G), Cytosine (C) or … Read entire article »

Filed under: The Basics

The ABCs of DNA — Chromosomes

The ABCs of DNA — Chromosomes

  What is a Chromosome?   When the very long polymeric molecule of DNA is wound around a protein called a histone into a thread like strand, it is called a chromosome. The histone not only supports the DNA strand, but on occasion it can control DNA expression by folding the DNA over a particular gene, physically blocking access to the gene and preventing it from being ‘read’ or transcribed.The DNA of eukaryotes and archae exists as chromosomes. Not … Read entire article »

Filed under: The Basics

The ABCs of DNA — The Cell

The ABCs of DNA — The Cell

What is a Cell? The simplest organisms are single-celled creatures such as bacteria and algae while more complex organisms, such as humans and trees, are comprised of many cells with specialized functions. Cells consist of membrane bound collections of DNA, proteins, sugars and cytosol –the jelly-like liquid inside the cell. The semi-porous cell membrane controls what enters and exits the cell. Scientists split cells into two main types: prokaryotic cells, such as those comprising bacteria and … Read entire article »

Filed under: The Basics