Do you know where your ancestors came from?
I know most of my ancestors were from England, Ireland, Scotland, and France. I know I have a great great grandmother who was Cherokee. I am not sure on Dad's side, but I think they were mostly Scottish and Welsh, possibly.
The point is, I have some clues about my ancestry.
Now, my son has some ideas, too.
There's a company out there called 23andMe and for $99 you can send them a vial of spit and find out a lot of information about yourself, based on your DNA.
For instance, we know that Michael is not likely to develop male pattern baldness.
We found out some interesting health information. For instance, the average risk for developing diabetes is 25.7%, but Michael's risk is 39.6%. He also is 10% more at risk for atrial fibrillation.
He's not at risk himself, but he is a carrier for a condition called hemochromatosis:
"Hereditary hemochromatosis (he-moe-kroe-muh-TOE-sis) causes your body to absorb too much iron from the food you eat. The excess iron is stored in your organs, especially your liver, heart and pancreas. The excess iron can poison these organs, leading to life-threatening conditions such as cancer, heart arrhythmias and cirrhosis." [source: Mayo Clinic]
This will only be of importance is he marries a woman and has children with her, and she also is a carrier. Then the children could develop the condition.
He's also at an elevated risk for a couple of medical issues, but nothing life-threatening.
It's all about risk. Most things they test for, his risk is normal. There are just a few variations.
I saw NOTHING that said he would ever, for sure, get Alzheimers or Huntington's Disease, for example. That's a relief.
He has a genetic tendency to have more growth in late adolescence, so it's possible he may get taller. He slept about 14 hours last Friday night, so I am hoping he will grow a bit more.
Then again, they said he is genetically related to Napoleon Bonaparte. Michael's take on that: "Oh great. I'm related to a short guy with anger issues."
I reminded him that Napoleon also conquered much of Europe and was a very smart guy.
The report tells us, under Traits, that Michael has very straight hair and brown eyes. Wow. We didn't say anything about that when we signed up.
He doesn't have the gene that most great sprinters have, but he is likely to have good athletic endurance. I told his tennis coach that.
It's a fascinating thing, the 23andMe report. There is SO MUCH information in the report, that we are still parsing through it.
Oh, and perhaps most interesting of all - he is 98% of Eastern European descent, and 1.5% Asian.Since Northern Kazakhstan was once part of Russia, that's not surprising. The Asian didn't surprise us, since he has a blood marker only found in Mongolia, Kazakhstan's neighbor to the east.
Fascinating.
Michael in Petropavlovsk in 2007, just before I brought him home
