For his big birthday Adam Keim wrote out a to-do list titled – “40 for 40.”<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-24145" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote-300x300.jpg" alt="Adam quote" width="300" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote-300x300.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote-150x150.jpg 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote-768x768.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote-880x880.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote-271x271.jpg 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote-372x372.jpg 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote-574x574.jpg 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote-980x980.jpg 980w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-quote.jpg 1000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />


It included little things like walking across the Golden Gate Bridge, volunteering for a day, and getting a massage.
“These are mostly things I have never done, things I have needed to do, and a few that I haven’t done in a long time,” Adam wrote across the top.


These were modest endeavors for a man facing his 40s, who wanted to spend a little time savoring what’s around him, take better care of himself, and maybe have some fun. But if you saw the list, you’d wonder why it took Adam until number 27 to include the one thing that he was always curious about – start researching who his biological family was.
“I always knew I was adopted but I never did anything about finding my natural parents,” he said.


Adam knew that he was born in San Diego, he was adopted when he was 4-months old, and that the foster parents called him Mike.
“I really knew nothing more,” Adam said.


Then Adam’s partner, Steve, gave him a 23andMe kit for Christmas. Little did Adam know, it would open up an entirely new personal history.

<h6>Starting from Scratch</h6>

From his 23andMe results, Adam found many DNA relatives including a few second and third cousins who sent him messages. They exchanged messages, but quickly realized it would be hard to determine the source of their DNA connection because of Adam being adopted.


&#8220;I had nothing to offer them,” he said. “No surnames. No history. Nothing at all.&#8221;


When Adam had just about given up on 23andMe and his search for his birth family, a bizarre string of messages changed his life.

<div style="float: right; text-align: justified; width: 350px; background-color: #eee; padding: 15px; margin-left: 10px;">Finding Lisa
Authorities believe Lisa was kidnapped as a toddler and held by a man until she was five. The man who took her was convicted of murder for killing a woman and sentenced to prison. He later died in prison without revealing where Lisa came from.

Now 30 years later, detectives from the Crimes Against Children Detail of the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department are working with genetic genealogist and DNA expert Barbara Rae-Venter to find Lisa’s biological family. Lisa, whose name is being withheld to protect her current identity, was too young at the time of her abduction to know or give any information about her biological parents or where she is from. Authorities are not even sure in which state or country she was abducted; her abductor had been in Quebec, Canada and all over the United States from the New England states to California.

They are not even sure when Lisa was born, but estimate it was about 1981, based on Lisa’s dental development at the time she was recovered. They also believe she was younger than two when she was abducted.For more information on the case or to learn how to help, email Barbara Rae-Venter at GenealogyConsult@gmail.com. Barbara is a retired patent attorney who specialized in biotechnology. In addition to a J.D., Barbara has a Ph.D. in biology, and before attending law school, taught biochemistry and endocrinology at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston,Texas.

</div>
A profile had appeared on his list of DNA relatives that wasn’t there previously. It listed Lisa as a likely second or third cousin.
He started receiving messages from a woman named Barbara Rae-Venter who was working with Lisa, and she asked Adam to “share genomes”.


She told him she was a volunteer with DNAadoption, and asked him to send his response to the DNAadoption website query line and that she’d in turn be able to put him in touch with a volunteers who could help him in his search.
<h6>
 More about Lisa</h6>

Even after sharing genomes, Adam was suspicious about the strange messages. He thought it might be a scam or ploy to get money from him. So after not replying to some of her messages, he got a long message from Barbara. She explained that she was working with a deputy from the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department to help Lisa – not her real name – learn who she is and try to find her own biological family.
As a toddler, Lisa had been kidnapped and was held captive for several years. After a few years, she managed to escape. Her kidnapper was later arrested and put in prison, where he later died. Unfortunately, he never offered up any information about Lisa’s origins, and as a result, the authorities could never identify Lisa’s biological parents to reunite her with her family.
Now more than 30 years later, with the help of expert researchers and genetic genealogists, as well as advancements in DNA testing, they are trying to help Lisa finally find answers. (See the sidebar to learn more about Lisa’s story and the effort to help her.)


At first the story they told seemed so awful that Adam had a hard time believing it.
“It was like something you see on a Thursday night TV crime show. This type of stuff doesn’t actually happen to real people,” Adam said.


They asked Adam for his help.
<div id="attachment_24148" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-24148" class="wp-image-24148 size-medium" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Rob-Adam-300x277.jpeg" alt="Rob &#038; Adam" width="300" height="277" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Rob-Adam-300x277.jpeg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Rob-Adam.jpeg 537w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Adam, on the right, and his brother Robert.</div>
He quickly shared his birth certificate and adoption records with Barbara, which included his adoptive mother’s maiden name and his birth date.
<h6>Finding His Mother</h6>
This information would allow Barbara, with the help of an adoption search angel, Diana Iwanski, to obtain information from his original birth certificate through a reverse look up microfiche. Within a day, Barbara and Diana had obtained Adam’s mother’s maiden name, his half-brother’s name (Robert), as well as the name Adam was given at birth – Michael Richard Kravan.


Although the deputy asked Adam to wait before trying to contact any family members until he could confirm the information on his birth mother by obtaining a copy of his original birth certificate from San Diego County, that didn’t stop Adam from looking online. Within minutes of learning his birth name and the name of his half-brother, he quickly found his profile on Facebook. It was there that Adam found pictures of his birth mother.
“When I saw them I just started balling my eyes out,” he said. “It’s hard to describe, being in your 40s and your whole life not knowing anything about your birth family and then all of a sudden, you see them. It all happened so fast. I went from getting a crazy email about a kidnapped girl to finding my birth family within a few days.”


All those emotions were mixed together when the deputy got back in touch with Adam a few months later and gave him the OK to contact his birth mother, Patti.
When they finally spoke on the phone, they were both overwrought with emotion. He tried to put her nerves at ease by explaining that he held no judgement, just joy for giving him life.

“I told her I had a great life and am very happy. I am very grateful that she put me up for adoption versus one of the alternatives.”

<h6>Close to Home</h6>

Patti and Robert only lived a few hours from Adam’s home in Oakland, California. He drove up to meet Robert first, then met Patti a few weeks later. The three met several times in those first few months and spent many hours together talking. Adam started getting answers to the holes in his past, and his mother was able to explain to Adam why he’d been given up for adoption.
“She had three children – all with different men,” Adam said. “She was a troubled young woman at the time; lots of drugs and alcohol and unfortunate situations that made raising a child tough.”


She in turn told him that he had another older brother, who she hadn’t seen for decades. Now Adam has put finding his oldest brother on his list of things to do in the coming year.
“Now that I’ve started learning about my birth family, I want to learn more and more,” Adam claimed.
<div id="attachment_24152" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-24152" class="size-medium wp-image-24152" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-His-Grandfather.001-300x193.jpg" alt="Adam's high school graduation picture, right, and a photo of his grandfather." width="300" height="193" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-His-Grandfather.001-300x193.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Adam-His-Grandfather.001.jpg 450w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Adam&#8217;s high school graduation picture, right, and a photo of his grandfather.</div>
<h6>
 Finding his birth father</h6>

His own search led to finding an uncle, Aaron, who is a half-brother of his birth mother, whom she never knew about before. Aaron’s father, Adam’s maternal grandfather was an actor in the 70s and 80s, and shares a striking physical resemblance to Adam.
DNA testing of Adam’s birth mother confirmed that Adam was connected to Lisa through his biological father.
Based on the family tree that Barbara built for Lisa and DNA information, both Lisa and Adam are connected to a man who was one of each of their closest matches. Through that connection Barbara identified the family she believes also include Adam’s father. DNA testing of a member of that family identified him as likely an uncle of Adam’s. But the definitive answer about who his father is, is still being sought. It’s another piece of his and Lisa’s puzzle they are trying solve.
He still can’t help but feel heartbroken by his cousin Lisa’s story.


“She deserves to find her family too,” he said. “I owe her so much and I look forward to the day I can meet her and thank her in person.”


The whole experience has brought peace to Adam. He always felt a disconnect with his adoptive family; they didn’t always get along and had very different personalities and interests. Now, finding relatives who are outgoing and creative like him, not to mention share physical and character traits, gives him a sense of belonging he didn’t have before.


“This entire experience has helped explain why I am the way I am,” he said, “and I am forever grateful.”

23andMe Blog

23andMe Blog Team

A List For Midlife

By Jonathan Fischer
My name is Jonathan Fischer.
I was adopted shortly after birth in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Not <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright wp-image-24099 size-medium" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote-300x300.jpg" alt="Jonathan F quote" width="300" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote-300x300.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote-150x150.jpg 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote-768x768.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote-880x880.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote-271x271.jpg 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote-372x372.jpg 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote-574x574.jpg 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote-980x980.jpg 980w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Jonathan-F-quote.jpg 1000w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />knowing more than where I was born, I always wondered about my origins and who my parents were. But I was also afraid about what I might find out, so for years I did nothing.
Then not too long ago I tried 23andMe.
Little did I know how much it would change my life.
My decision to take the leap and explore where I came from started in a small cafe along Alki Beach in West Seattle in the summer of 2013. I sat and talked to a dear friend, who is also a genealogist. I told her about both my curiosity and my fears.
She recommended trying 23andMe, so I did.


Right away I learned some health information, and that I was over 3 percent Neanderthal, something my wife says explains a lot.
But I also found people I was related to genetically. Using 23andMe’s “DNA Relatives,” I connected with many cousins some very distant and others much closer and even received a message from one of these close cousins. Turned out he was related to me through my paternal side, and, fortunately for me, he was also a genealogy buff.
He told me that finding me – a second cousin he’d never heard of – piqued his interest. How were we connected, he wondered. Our emails finally led to a phone conversation.
Although my initial intent hadn’t been to find relatives, when he asked me if I wanted to know the identity of my biological father, I didn’t hesitate:


“Yes!” I told him. 
Analyzing a family tree, he used a simple process of elimination to identify the man he thought was my father, and offered up a name.
After that phone conversation I wondered what I had just done. I had no idea what piercing the veil of secrecy would mean for me or this man and his family, but finding a name pushed me to take the next step, so I began taking a more traditional approach: filling out a form with the state of Wisconsin’s Department of Children and Families asking for my adoption file. This would give me access to a redacted file of my adoption.


What I got was my birth certificate and some basic facts about my biological mother but without any identifying information. I learned that only a single parent was listed on my original birth certificate, as my biological mother had not chosen to establish paternity. Although paternity was not established, there were details from the caseworker about my alleged father. Enough detail in fact that I was able to compare some of that information to the information supplied by my newly found second cousin, giving me some confidence that indeed I had the correct name for my biological father.


So in January 2014 I took a deep breath, and wrote him a letter.
The day it arrived, my biological father called four times trying to get in touch. When I got home from work, I quickly called him back and we talked into the night. It was like being born all over again. He confirmed that I was indeed his son, something we triple checked later when he also tested with 23andMe. We stayed in touch and arranged to meet in person.
In August of 2014 I met him, his brother, my uncle, and my half-brothers and sisters at a family dinner arranged for my visit. I had to muster all my courage to walk into that room. While my half-brothers and sisters were initially shocked to find out they had an older brother, they were friendly but guarded. Our relationship has grown since then.
Back when I had asked the state for my adoption file, I had also checked a box requesting contact with my biological mother. I was fortunate for how easy it was for my caseworker to find her.
Because of the success with my father, I also I got my hopes up that I would get a chance to meet her too. But that was not the case, at least at first. After much consideration she declined to establish contact. For years, I’d never allowed myself to even hope I would find her, but being so close and then her declining to make contact was disappointing to say the least. I was crushed.
But I decided not to let it go at that. I still wanted to know who she was.
Using the information I had from my case file, as well as information from the 1940 Census, I found her name. Although there was nothing stopping me from writing her a letter, I felt any contact that didn’t go through the state would be totally inappropriate. Occasionally I would Google my mother’s family. It was a difficult time. I worried that although I knew who they were, I’d never get a chance to meet them.
Then I thought of a quote from the Book of Lamentations:
“The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.”


So I waited.


In May of 2016, I was visiting my biological dad for his birthday when I received a text from my wife. Check your email she said. There was a message from my caseworker telling me that my biological mother had changed her mind. She was ready to have contact, and my caseworker wanted to know if I was still interested in meeting her. I said yes, emphatically.


A few weeks later I went to Michigan to meet my mom, and my half-brothers and half-sister and their families.  My half brothers and sister were delighted to find out that my existence was real after all.
Since connecting with them, I’ve been able to establish close relationships with both my biological parents. I talk to my mother every week and my father daily.


I’m a lucky man. I once had but one family, now I have three. My adoption experience was special and I was fortunate to have been adopted by a very loving, successful, happy and intelligent couple. After adopting me my parents conceived my sister.
Now I’ve met both my biological parents and their families, who are also filled with successful, happy and intelligent people. I’ve gone from having one sister to having ten siblings, and a passel of nieces and nephews. Not many adoptees have this kind of success finding biological relatives.
I guess I would have to say that I’m a very lucky guy thanks to 23andMe.


Jonathan is a CPA living in the Pacific Northwest with his wife and two kids.

A Lucky Man

Editor&#8217;s note: We first ran this blog post a few years back and thought we&#8217;d revisit it for this year&#8217;s July 4th.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter wp-image-14170 size-full" src="http://35.88.189.111/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/declaration_independence_70222_1.jpg" alt="" width="768" height="504" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/declaration_independence_70222_1.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/declaration_independence_70222_1-300x197.jpg 300w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px" />
Through the magic of the Internet you can now examine the yellowing<a href="https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/declara/images/wtmanltr.jpg" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"> letters of Thomas Jefferson</a>, <a href="https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/images/bf0017s.jpg" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Benjamin Franklin’s first ideas for a colonial confederation</a> in his own handwriting and early<a href="https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/declara/images/frag1.jpg"> drafts of the U.S. Constitution</a> complete with strikethroughs and other edits.
For most Americans, especially on<a href="http://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/facts_for_features_special_editions/cb12-ff12.html"> Independence Day</a>, looking at the handwritten notes of some of the country&#8217;s founders offers a visceral connection to the country’s beginning. Seeing their scratch marks on pages faded and wrinkled with age gives people a connection to their history.
In some ways,<a href="https://www.23andme.org/ancestry/"> exploring your ancestry</a> through your DNA stirs up a similar emotional response.
The “writing” in our DNA doesn’t just tell us about ourselves; it tells us about our connection to human history.
As George Church, the Harvard genetics professor and founder of the <a href="http://www.personalgenomes.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Personal Genome Project</a> once said:
“Written records go back to the dawn of written history. DNA goes back to the dawn of human existence.”
Within each of us is a genetic record of <a href="https://www.23andme.org/gen101/prehistory/outofafrica/#harsher_climate_harder_migrations">our ancestry</a>, including on what branch of the world’s family tree our paternal or maternal lines belong. 
While none of the Founding Fathers were customers of 23andMe, we do know a little about their DNA because of publicly-available records of testing done on their direct descendants. 23andMe customers can look back not just at their own ancestry, but they can also see if they share a maternal or paternal line with the likes of Benjamin Franklin,<a href="http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/brief-biography-thomas-jefferson"> Thomas Jefferson</a>,<a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/about/presidents/johnadams"> John Adams,</a> and<a href="http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=h000101"> Alexander Hamilton</a>.
Franklin’s maternal line, which traces from his mother to his mother’s mother and so on back in time, is Haplogroup V. This branch of the human family tree is believed to have originated in Europe 12,000 years ago. Only about four percent of Europeans share this haplogroup, which is much more common among Finns, Sardinians and Basques. Known for his wit and wisdom, Franklin also helped draft the Constitution and profoundly influence the character of the Nation. Although he never became president he embodied what many believe to be the essence of what it means to be an American.
Adams, a Harvard-trained lawyer who served as Vice President to George Washington and afterwards the second US President, had the paternal haplogroup R1b1.
This haplogroup also emerged out of Europe, but 30,000 years ago and is common among people of Irish, British, Dutch and German ancestry. (His son John Quincy Adams, the sixth US President, also shared this paternal haplogroup.)
Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence and the third US President, had the unusual paternal Haplogroup T, which is more common among people of the Middle East, although it is also found in England. Jefferson traced his paternal ancestry back to Wales where T is very rare. DNA has also factored into determining that the rumors that Jefferson fathered at least one child <a href="https://www.23andme.org/blog/articles/historys-mysteries-finding-answers-in-our-dna">with his slave Sally Hemings</a> are probably true.
Finally, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Hamilton">Alexander Hamilton</a>, Washington’s Secretary of Treasury and the guy on the $10 bill, had a paternal Haplogroup I1a. This haplogroup is common among Finns, Norwegians and Swedes.
As we consider our country&#8217;s forefathers this Independence Day, these influential men need not be distant historic figures. Rather, a closer look at our DNA may reveal that these men are family. Those of us who share genetic connections to these forefathers can take pride in their family&#8217;s role in the birth of this nation.

Founding Fathers’ DNA

Over the years we&#8217;ve been lucky enough to hear from customers who&#8217;ve used 23andMe to connect with their dads.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-21188" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/David-Quote-200x200.jpg" alt="David Quote" width="200" height="200" />


Some of them simply shared their results to see the kinds of traits they shared with the fathers. But several customers, mostly adoptees, have been able to use 23andMe to find their biological fathers. We&#8217;ve heard from  several who have found their fathers and met them for the first time.
As we get ready to celebrate Father&#8217;s Day we wanted to share one of those stories with you.
Here&#8217;s David Alquist&#8217;s story, which was recently picked up by Channel 9 in Denver. 
<iframe loading="lazy" width="640" height="360" style="border-width: 0;" src="https://interactive.tegna-media.com/video/embed/embed.html?id=2221711&#038;type=video&#038;title=DNA%20match%20helps%20Westminster%20man%20find%20biological%20father&#038;site=73&#038;playerid=6918249996581&#038;dfpid=32805352&#038;dfpposition=Video_prestream_external §ion=home"></iframe>

Happy Father’s Day 2016

Among the many brilliant performances on the History Channels remake of the series <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright size-thumbnail wp-image-23978" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_short-200x200.png" alt="04012016_ancestryQuote_short" width="200" height="200" />best known for her work on the stage.


Like many of the actors who were part of this series, and the original that first aired 39 years ago, the part had special meaning for Rose, as she said in a recent interview with <a href="http://variety.com/2016/tv/news/roots-remake-history-kizzy-anika-noni-rose-anika-noni-rose-1201785035/">Variety</a>.


“I’m very proud of being able to be a part of this and bring it back for a new generation of audiences,” she said. “Because it is ours. It is the story  of America. I’m proud to be able to bring it back and make it relevant again.”
In the spirit of Alex Haley, the search for his own family’s roots that inspired his powerful novel, many of those involved in this series explored their own ancestry including <a href="http://roots.history.com/identity">using 23andMe</a>. Rose was among those who tested with  23andMe, learning about her own roots in West Africa.
Take a look at what Anika Noni Rose says about testing and her role in the series. 
<iframe loading="lazy" width="640" height="360" src="https://www.history.com/embed/695909443688" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>

Know Your Roots

Two fire-scarred circular structures found hidden in a cave in France have altered scientists’ perceptions of our early human cousins, the Neanderthals.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-23993" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/6000-300x180.jpg" alt="6000" width="300" height="180" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/6000-300x180.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/6000-768x461.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/6000-1024x614.jpg 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/6000-880x528.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/6000-1180x708.jpg 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/6000.jpg 1920w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
What these almost 200,000 year-old sophisticated structures were used for remains unknown, but their discovery, described in<a href="https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature18291.html"> the journal Nature</a>, illustrates a level of planning and organization among Neanderthal that was not known before.
“Our results therefore suggest that the Neanderthal group responsible for these constructions had a level of social organization that was more complex than previously thought,” the paper’s authors conclude.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright wp-image-23459 size-medium" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Neanderthal-Image-247x300.jpg" alt="Neanderthal Image" width="247" height="300" />This adds to our understanding of our ancient human cousin, and what distinguishes them from modern humans. It’s another bit of evidence to suggest that Neanderthals were more advanced than we once thought. Neanderthals thrived in Eurasia for hundreds of thousands of years before early modern humans migrated out of Africa. At some point humans and Neanderthals crossed paths, and as shown in recent DNA studies, they intermixed. Neanderthals disappeared about 40,000 years ago, but their DNA lives on in all humans outside of Africa.
This finding, at the Bruniquel Cave in southwest France, illustrates Neanderthals may have been much more advanced than we once thought.  Over the last few years other findings have indicated that Neanderthals created tools and jewelry, and ritually buried their dead.
In the cave researchers documented how the stalagmites were each chopped into similar heights of a little over a foot high, and then arranged into two oval shapes. This was done a few hundred feet inside the cave where light didn’t penetrate, and there was evidence that they used animal bones for torches. Along the structures are specific sites that show evidence of the use of fire. There are no indications that the cave was used as a dwelling or shelter, so the purpose of the site is still a mystery. But it’s construction with hundreds of evenly cut pieces, arranged in a specific pattern, necessitated some planning.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-23992" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/2090-300x112.jpg" alt="2090" width="300" height="112" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/2090-300x112.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/2090-768x286.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/2090-1024x381.jpg 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/2090-880x328.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/2090-1180x439.jpg 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/2090.jpg 1920w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Why Neanderthals – and another ancient cousin the Denisovans – died out and modern humans survived is a question that scientists are still trying to answer. Many of the revelations around these two ancient human cousins have been made through the use of DNA. Some suggest that intermixing with Neanderthals – which occurred about 60,000 years ago – may have helped give modern humans an <a href="https://www.23andme.org/blog/news/the-lasting-legacy-of-neanderthals/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">evolutionary advantage </a>perhaps giving them a better immune response against disease as they migrated into Europe and Asia.
Understanding the traits we shared with our ancient cousins, and those we did not, will help us better understand why we survived and thrived and the Neanderthals did not, and ultimately it will help us to better understand what makes us human.

Neanderthals Were More Advanced Than Once Believed

In a wonderful interview he did with comedian W. Kamau Bell, actor and producer Levar Burton explained the significance of the current reboot of the series<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-23977" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-300x300.png" alt="04012016_ancestryQuote_long" width="300" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-300x300.png 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-150x150.png 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-768x768.png 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-1024x1024.png 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-880x880.png 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-271x271.png 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-372x372.png 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-574x574.png 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long-980x980.png 980w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/04012016_ancestryQuote_long.png 1080w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />


“Whether you feel like it has any relevance or meaning to you, the real truth is that it does,”<a href="http://www.motherjones.com/media/2016/04/history-roots-2016-remake-levar-burton-kamau-bell" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"> Burton said featured in the magazine Mother Jones.</a> “If you are part of the fabric of America, this is your story, too.”


That was, in part, what appealed to viewers so much when the original mini-series premiered almost 40 years ago. Roots drew in more than 100 million viewers at the time and garnered nine Emmy awards. Burton, then 19, starred as the young Kunta Kinte, both he and the series became a generational touchstone for many people, particularly African Americans.



Based on a novel by<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/546018.Roots"> Alex Haley</a>, the series tells a personal story of tracing Haley’s family history being torn from Africa, through the awful Middle Passage, and ultimately bondage in America. And driving that story all along was Haley’s own quest to learn about himself, his family and where his ancestors came from.
In an article in Reader’s Digest in the 1970s, Haley said that yearning is universal.


“In all of us there is a hunger, narrow and deep, to know our heritage to know who we are and where we have come from,” Haley said. “Without this enriching knowledge, there is a hollow yearning. No matter what our attainments in life, there is a vacuum, an emptiness and a most disquieting loneliness.”


Many Americans are interested in their ancestors and their own cultural origins, but for African Americans, that question can be particularly hard to answer. Slavery severed their connections to Africa and the rich diversity of cultures there. Haley’s book offered African Americans a roadmap of sorts for tracing their own family stories and it reminded Americans of their own country’s history.
The advent of genetic testing has offered many African Americans a window into their ancestry that they couldn’t see any other way.
For Burton, who tested with<a href="https://www.23andme.org/roots/"> 23andMe</a>, testing was eye opening, and it’s offered others a goldmine of information that just wasn’t available before.
&#8220;I&#8217;ve always felt there was a piece of me missing,&#8221; <a href="https://www.colorlines.com/articles/see-levar-burton-malachi-kirby-learn-about-their-roots" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Burton said.</a> “I’m sure a lot of black people in this country have that same feeling… that who I am did not just begin here; that I’m part of a lineage that goes back much further than that… and to have the proof in my hand&#8230;it’s powerful.”
See Burton and the actor Malachi Kirby, who plays Kunta Kinte in the new version of Roots, talk about using 23andMe to explore their ancestry.
 
<iframe loading="lazy" width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/y_gJ9inlFG0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>

Roots Revisited

Sandi had 50 years to prepare for this moment, but as she walked off a plane in Sacramento she felt the anxiety and doubt well-up inside.
&nbsp;
<div id="attachment_23917" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-23917" class="size-thumbnail wp-image-23917" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/Candance-Christine-Sandra-Sandi-200x200.jpg" alt="From left Candace, Christine, Sandra and Sandi, having lunch the day Sandi met them for the first time." width="200" height="200" />From left Candace, Christine, Sandra and Sandi.</div>
“It was like the night before you get married and you get cold feet or jitters,” said the 50 year-old mother from New Hampshire. “You just know that in a moment your life is going to change, and you worry that maybe you’re not ready.”


Adopted at birth in Florida, Sandi had spent her whole life looking for her biological mother, wondering if she was out there somewhere.
Then after decades of searching without success, she found her after discovering a second cousin named Steve on 23andMe. Her cousin, who is about ten years older, had remembered when his aunt, Sandi’s mom, was pregnant with her. 
<div id="attachment_23916" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-23916" class="size-thumbnail wp-image-23916" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/ChristineSandi-200x200.jpg" alt="Christine, left, and her sister Sandi." width="200" height="200" />Christine, left, and her sister Sandi.</div>
It was through Steve that Sandi was able to connect with her mother and sister. Sandi’s trip across the country – just two weeks before Mother’s Day – was her chance to meet her mom for the first time. It was a meeting she’d fanaticized about her whole life, but as Sandi got closer to meeting her mother, she became more and more nervous.
While she splashed water on her face in the airport bathroom and ratcheted up her courage, her mother Sandra Freeland and Sandi’s sisters, Christine Herrera and Candace Campbell – who she was also meeting for the first time – had their own anxious moments as they waited for her in the terminal.
Christine had already bonded with Sandi through Facebook and several phone calls, but seeing Sandi in person for the first time triggered all sorts of emotions.
“There was so much going on inside me it’s hard to describe what I was feeling,” said Christine, who is Sandi’s full sister.


All her life, Christine felt like something or someone was missing. She had known most of her life that she had a sister out there, who’d been given up for adoption by her mother. Now after finding Sandi she felt like she was uncovering a missing part of herself.
For their mother, Sandra, meeting her daughter Sandi instantly brought her back to the few days she had with her as a newborn just before giving her up. At the time she’d been an out-of-work single mother trying to raise another another young daughter. County social workers in Florida had encouraged Sandra to give up the newborn for adoption, telling Sandra that if she kept Sandi there was a chance she’d lose both of her girls. It was an awful choice, but Sandra thought that giving up Sandi would offer her a better life than she could give her. But it was agony letting her go.
“I never stopped thinking about her,” Sandra said more than 50 years later. “Never. She was constantly on my mind.”


Each of the women were wound tight with emotion as Sandi walked into the terminal and into her mother’s arms for the first time in 50 years. As they held each other Christine stood next to them with tears in her eyes and her hands over her mouth.
They held each other for a very long time, and then Sandra whispered into her daughter’s ear.


“I told her it felt so good to hold her again and that I never wanted to let her go,” Sandra said. “And then I told her that I always loved her and I never stopped loving her.”


As she looked into her daughter&#8217;s eyes she instantly remembered holding her as an infant and the staring into her young eyes then, she said.
Almost weak in the knees with her own emotion, Sandi said none of the millions of meetings she’d imagined having with her mother over the years was quite as good as what really happened.
Sandi had been raised by a couple who’d been unable to have children. They were older when they adopted her, and they both passed away by the time Sandi was just 25. Although she adored her adopted father, she said her relationship with her adopted mother was more difficult. Still Sandi is thankful they provided her a stable upbringing. But Sandi never stopped looking for her biological mother, and over the years she’d fantasized about meeting her.


“To be held like that was something I’d dreamed about my whole life,” Sandi said. “I mean, it was my own mom holding me in her arms telling me she loved me, telling me how much she loved and missed me my whole life. It was amazing.”


For Christine, too, the moment was a bit surreal and overwhelming.
<div id="attachment_23918" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-23918" class="size-thumbnail wp-image-23918" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/Candance-Sandra-Sandi-Christine-200x200.jpg" alt="From left Candace, Sandra, Sandi and Christine." width="200" height="200" />From left Candace, Sandra, Sandi and Christine.</div>
“I’m still in awe, still dumbfounded by it,” she said.


Just 11 months younger than Sandi, Christine said meeting her sister – their older sister had passed away more than a decade ago – was also something she’d dreamed about. Deep down Christine always thought she’d been a twin, and that missing twin sister was out there somewhere. Finally meeting Sandi and spending time with her she felt like reconnecting a missing part of herself. The connection she has had with her sister is like nothing she experienced before.
After meeting at the airport, Sandi spent a few days with Christine, and then met her extended family at a dinner in Sacramento – including her cousin Steve with whom she connected on 23andMe and who helped her find her mother. Sandi also got some more one-on-one time with her mother. She had a week on the coast before having to return home to her own kids.


“It’s crazy to have spent my whole life looking and then to finally find her,” she said. “It’s been amazing. It’s something I’ve yearned for my whole life, and that yearning never went away. It was important to hear that I wasn’t some kind of mistake. That I was loved and missed.”


And now she has someone she can wish Happy Mother’s Day.

Mother’s Day Delayed

<div id="attachment_23893" style="width: 209px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-23893" class="wp-image-23893 size-medium" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/David.Poznik-preferred-copy-199x300.jpg" alt="David.Poznik-preferred copy" width="199" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/David.Poznik-preferred-copy-199x300.jpg 199w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/David.Poznik-preferred-copy-768x1156.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/David.Poznik-preferred-copy-680x1024.jpg 680w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/David.Poznik-preferred-copy-585x880.jpg 585w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/David.Poznik-preferred-copy-784x1180.jpg 784w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/David.Poznik-preferred-copy-scaled.jpg 1701w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 199px) 100vw, 199px" />David Poznik</div>
In the largest study of genetic variation within the human Y chromosome, an international team of scientists has traced back branches of the male line almost 200,000 years, revealing points in history of major population expansions that appear to correspond to eras of innovation and human migration.
David Poznik, a Computational Biologist and Population Geneticist here at 23andMe and the lead author of<a href="https://www.nature.com/ng/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ng.3559.html"> the paper</a>, worked on the study while completing his graduate research in <a href="http://bmi.stanford.edu/">Stanford’s Program in Biomedical Informatics</a>. Scientists from the <a href="http://www.sanger.ac.uk/">Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute</a> in the UK and from more than a dozen other institutions also contributed to the study.


Because the Y chromosome is passed in whole from fathers to sons through the generations, it offers a unique opportunity to reconstruct migrations that have taken millennia to manifest. By analyzing changes that have slowly accumulated over time, the 42 scientists were able to uncover a hidden history within the DNA sequences of 1,244 men representing 26 populations from around the world. The team used more than 60,000 Y-chromosome SNVs (positions at which at least one sequence differs from the others) to construct a tree that indicates how all the Y chromosomes are related to one another. Using the tree, they were able to follow modern male lines backward, ultimately tracing back almost 200,000 years to the most recent common paternal-line ancestor of almost all men currently living today.
<div id="attachment_23892" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-23892" class="wp-image-23892 size-medium" src="https://www.23andme.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/1000y-300x243.jpg" alt="1000y" width="300" height="243" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/1000y-300x243.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/1000y.jpg 584w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Tracing back in time paternal-lines from 26 different populations worldwide.</div>
One notable feature of the Y-chromosome tree is that the different male lines naturally cluster into what are known as “paternal haplogroups” or “clades.” These groupings often correspond to different continental populations and can distinguish, for example, someone with Native American paternal ancestry from someone whose paternal line traces to Western Europe.


As a working group of the <a href="http://www.1000genomes.org/">1000 Genomes Project</a>, the researchers had access to full sequences, which they compared to one another to measure distances between different groupings or clades. Since mutations steadily accumulate, these sequence distances correspond to temporal distances, with greater dissimilarities between sequences corresponding to longer separation times between their respective groups. Using published estimates of the Y-chromosome mutation rate, they estimated the timings of divergences between different haplogroups.
At certain points in history, particularly around 50,000 years ago and again approximately 15,000 years ago, several different lineages branched off from one another at the same time, marking major bursts in population growth. The times of these bursts overlap with human migrations into Eurasia and into the Americas, respectively. Between approximately 8,000 years ago and 4,000 years ago, there were other distinct periods of expansion in sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and Western Europe.
While the specific causes of those expansions are less clear, Dr. Chris Tyler-Smith, from the Sanger Institute believes that “the best explanation is that they may have resulted from advances in technology that could be controlled by small groups of men. Wheeled transport, metal working, and organized warfare are all candidate explanations that can now be investigated further.”


It will be interesting for scientists to use this DNA history in conjunction with archeological evidence to reconstruct the history of human migration across the globe.
It will be interesting for scientists to use this DNA history in conjunction with archeological evidence to reconstruct the history of human migration across the globe.

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