Iberian Ashkenaz/ EEIJH - News

The ISOGG Y-DNA J branch of the phylogenetic tree has been updated for 2010. Here is the website:
http://www.isogg.org/tree/ISOGG_HapgrpJ.html
The former sub-branch J1e is now called J1c3. The recently discovered SNP L-147 defines J1c3d.


Do you want to see the distribution of your Iberian surname in Spain today? Here is the link. Enter your surname in the box in the upper right: http://www.ine.es/fapel/FAPEL.INICIO?lang=EN


As a project supported by the International Institute for Jewish Genealogy and the Paul Jacobi Center at the Jewish National and University Library, Jerusalem, Maria Jose Surribas is translating archival records from the town of Cervera in Catalonia, Spain. This has relevance for Iberian Ashkenaz project members since Cervera was a major Medieval Jewish community and a crossroad on the routes leading from France, Girona and Barcelona to the rest of Spain. Here's a link to the website:

http://www.iijg.org/home/cervera_archives.html


See our project in the Jerusalem Post. Schelly Talalay Dardashti wrote an excellent article "When Oral History meets Genetics."

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?apage=2&cid=1206632365879&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


Family Tree DNA previewed several exciting innovations at the October 2007 conference in Houston that will become available to project members during the next few months. Bennett Greenspan, CEO of Family Tree DNA, introduced MyMaps, which has great potential for tracing ancestral migration routes from Spain and Portugal to Northern and Eastern Europe. The MyMaps tool is an innovative genetic mapping system that enables individuals to identify their possible specific geographical origins. MyMaps will display a pushpin on the latitude and longitude of the most distant known ancestor of each of your matches, color-coded by genetic distance. Please make sure you enter the geographic coordinates of your most distant known ancestor's village of origin on the user preference page of your FTDNA personal website.

Dr. Michael Hammer, Geneticist and Director of the Genomic Analysis
and Technology Core facility at the University of Arizona and Family
Tree DNA's Chief Scientist, previewed highlights from his
soon-to-be-published paper on the new phylogenetic tree named the YCC
(Y Chromosome Consortium), a theoretical construct positing how
evolution took place on the Y chromosome. The new tree-branch names will be appearing on your results page and on the project webpage.

"A Walk thru the Y Chromosome" is the significant third in the trio
of Family Tree DNA innovations introduced at the two-day conference.
Thomas Krahn, Director of Family Tree DNA's Genomics Research Center,
made the presentation, detailing a test to sequence vast sections of
the Y chromosome. Those interested in finding family connections can
order a fragment of their own DNA and check for an apparent match with
others who have had the test. This has the potential of being enormously useful in identifying a particular family marker.