Using data pulled from online genealogy sites, a renowned ‘genome hacker’ has constructed what is likely the biggest family trees ever assembled. The researcher and his team now plan to use the data — including a single uber-pedigree comprising 13 million individuals, which stretches back to the 15th century — to analyse the inheritance of complex genetic traits, such as longevity and facial features.
The structures of the trees themselves could provide interesting information about human demographics and population expansions, says Nancy Cox, a human geneticist at the University of Chicago, Illinois, who was not involved in the study. But more interesting, she says, is the possibility that such data may one day be linked to medical information or DNA sequence data as more people have their genomes sequenced and stored in public databases.
Read the full, original story here: Genome hacker uncovers largest-ever family tree
Additional Resources:
- “One Big Family,” Scientist
- “If your genome is public, so are you, researchers find,” Los Angeles Times
