Thursday, February 16, 2017

The New Living DNA Test: A Review of My Results


I mailed in my complimentary Living DNA kit at the end of October. The test is performed using the Illumina Global Screening Array Chip. I took some photos of the kit, so testers will know what to expect. 

The Kit



Living DNA uses a swab for sample collection, as shown here. There are two in each kit. The collection process is relatively easy and involves no liquid. Although Living DNA is a British company, the mailing address for my kit was Eurofins Genomics in Louisville, Kentucky. (Eurofins is one of their partners according to the website, and the testing is done in Denmark.) The decision to use swabs for DNA collection instead of saliva, undoubtedly, makes shipping the samples to the lab from the United States, and internationally within Europe, simpler.


I received my results on February 7th, just as I was leaving for RootsTech. Now that I am home, I have had a chance to finally look them over.

Results
My results include an admixture prediction (percentages of overall ancestral origins based on autosomal DNA) and my mtDNA haplogroup (which was correct - U5b1b2). Males will also receive their Y-DNA haplogroup. 

Currently, there is no relative matching feature, but it is expected to be added in the near future, which will be essential for genealogical and unknown parentage applications. This will be a terrific addition to the U.S.-based databases we already use in our research, since it will have a unique British, and presumably, European market. 


I was excited to receive these results since I have recent English ancestry and they promised to provide a very detailed breakdown of ancestral origins within the British Isles, with 21 separate categories. You can see the descriptions of those categories here

Reportedly, this test is only looking back to where your ancestors were about four to five generations ago, but the What you are made of section on the site states, "A typical profile provides your genetic ancestry going back about six generations." Either way, this is not a deep ancestry analysis and should reflect what we know about our recent ancestors. (Edit: The site has been updated to reflect a ten generation reach, which makes more sense to me.)

Like 23andMe's former version of Ancestry Composition, the admixture results are presented at three different levels: Global, Regional and Sub-Regions. 

Here are mine. 

Global

At 23andMe, I am 100% European. 
At AncestryDNA, I am 99% European.
At Family Tree DNA, I am 97% European.

Regional

At 23andMe, I am 24.8% British/Irish and 22% Finnish. 
At AncestryDNA, I am 0% Great Britain, 10% Irish and 21% Finland/Northwest Russia.
At Family Tree DNA, I am 27% British Isles and 23% Finland and Northern Siberian.

It is immediately obvious that something is off with the Living DNA estimate, since my grandmother was of full Finnish ancestry and all three of the other companies accurately detect that (21% - 23%). Conversely, Living DNA only estimates 12.6% in their Europe East category for me, which includes Finnish DNA.  (On a side note, I consider this a misnomer. Finland is generally not considered to be part of Eastern Europe.) 

 Results Map


On the "Your Family Ancestry" page, in the How the Science Works section, Living DNA states this:
I do not accept that explanation and I hope their other customers will not be misled by it either. It is absurd to claim that it is realistically possible to inherit 0% of a grandparent's DNA. 

LivingDNA estimates that 81.7% of my DNA comes from Great Britain and Ireland. That is a significant overestimate. I have one great grandfather of full British ancestry (~12.5%) and one second great grandmother of full British ancestry (~6.25%). All of the rest of my known British ancestry, with the exception of two possible Irish 5th great grandparents, is Colonial American.  I do have some genealogical brick walls, but my matches on those lines do not indicate that behind any of them is a recent British ancestor. The other reputable companies estimate I am between 10% - 27% British/Irish. 

CeCe's Family Tree, British Ancestors in Red
Click on Image to Enlarge

I also have a great grandparent of full Norwegian ancestry as well as a significant amount of German ancestry. 

So, let's look at my Sub-regional estimates:

Sub Regions
Click on Image to Enlarge


According to these results, my ancestors came from many different areas of England, which is certainly possible if you look very deep into my pedigree, back to my immigrant ancestors in the 1600's. Focusing on my more recent English ancestors, let's see if these estimates are consistent with their known origins.

My great grandfather, George Henry Allen was born in Australia, but both of his parents, George Allen (b.1851) and Flora Chitts (b.1849) were born in Gloucestershire, England, as were their known ancestors. So, I should have inherited about 12.5% of my DNA from this area. According to this page, Gloucestershire ancestry would fall into the South Central England sub-region. I have an estimated 8% from this category. So, a little low, but not impossible when taking into account the randomness of recombination. 

My third great grandfather Thomas Armstrong was born 1801 in Cumberland (as were his known ancestors). I would have inherited approximately 3.125% of my DNA from him. The area that was once Cumberland is now part of Cumbria. According to Living DNA I have 6.4% in the Cumbria category. 

My third great grandmother Dorothy Hudspith was born 1811 in Northumberland (as were her known ancestors). I would carry about 3.125% of her DNA. Northumberland would be in the Northumbria category. 0% of my DNA is predicted to have originated in Northumbria.  

As I mentioned, I have two unconfirmed fifth great grandparents from Ireland (on different lines). One of them was reportedly born in County Armagh. If this is accurate, then I would expect to have about 1.56% of Irish DNA. I have 2.1% in the Southwest Scotland and Northern Ireland category, so this appears to be roughly consistent. 

What does that leave?
14.5% South Wales Border - no known recent ancestry from this area
14.1% Central England - no known recent ancestry from this area
12.4% Southeast England - This category could be representative of my German ancestry. The site states this about it: 

5.8% Cornwall - no known recent ancestry from this area
5.1% South Yorkshire - no known recent ancestry from this area
1.3% Northwest England - no known recent ancestry from this area
1.1% Devon - no known recent ancestry from this area
11.5% Unassigned Great Britain and Ireland 

12.6% Finland and Western Russia - expected ~25%
4.2% Scandinavia - expected ~12.5%

Conclusions
Due to my large amount of distant Colonial American ancestry, my overall British DNA is likely a challenge to specifically categorize. Focusing on my last six generations, these results were not consistent with my known ancestry. Failing to recognize half of my Finnish ancestry and significantly underestimating my Norwegian/Scandinavian ancestry does not inspire confidence. The site explained that German ancestry could be included in the Southeast England category, so that may explain why none of mine showed up elsewhere. Even with this caveat, however, this does not accurately portray my ancestral origins. 

I suspect that I am not the only one who will see over-inflated British percentages, but that remains to be seen when more results are delivered and reviews published.  

This test's launch has been highly anticipated and has definitely been getting a lot of buzz, but I think it is important to recognize that any time a company is claiming to provide very specific sub-regional percentages, we must take it with a big dose of salt. As always, I support and appreciate the efforts to advance our field. It has to start somewhere and we can't expect perfection. I look forward to improvements and the future of this exciting company. 

If you are interested in seeing what Living DNA will predict for you, you can order your kit here

41 comments:

  1. Thanks for sharing this CeCe -- I really like the fact that they automatically give you mtDNA and Y DNA -- I think the bigger testing companies could/should do that -- but disappointed in their ethnicity estimates . . . hopefully with time they will become more accurate.

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  2. Thanks for reporting on this company's ethnicity results and giving the heads up that they may offer matching in future.
    PS. I think there was a "1" missing when you summarized your AncestryDNA ethnicity (I'm guessing the British was 10% and not 0%.

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    1. Nope - 0% British is correct. Ancestry did not predict any for me at all.

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  3. Your father and your Aunt are both matching many on my eastern European/Slavic line. Both of them are often pulling up in my database matching those from Croatia, Montenegro Serbia and Bosnia. Many are still living in the old country

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    1. Hi Laura, Is there any Ashkenazi in that line? We discovered a small amount through testing and, as a result, have a ton of Eastern European matches. We also have a couple of significant brick walls on my paternal side that may have something interesting behind them, but it does not appear to be British, as mentioned above. We do show small amounts of Eastern European admixture at 23andMe, but I am not sure if it is "real." Do you know what chromosomes we are matching on? If so, I can check to see if it is either on our predicted jewish segments or Eastern European ones.

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    2. Hi CeCe,
      There isn't any Ashkenazi that I'm aware of, there is a good amount of Greek, middle eastern and southern European from this line. I don't feel that my 23andme ethnic results are very accurate and their Eastern European is just too broad. FTDNA is more in line to my findings as they show part of the lower Balkans as Southern European.

      I'll check on the chromosomes and get back to you ;o)

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    3. Hi CeCe,
      I took the time to look over my database carefully and here is what I came up with
      Matching your dad on Chromosome 4 @ 151.3 -164.6
      Chromosome 8 various at places matching your Dad
      Direct match on Chromosome 12 to your Dad @ 123.8 -126.1 also many others on down
      Chromosome 15 @24.4 -28 Direct match to your Dad and many others
      Chromosome 13 @ 44.9 – 51.3 this is a match to your aunt and he is a strong Slavic match to me, I don’t see this too often but he is matching your aunt all along this chromosome and pulling up others in common with me.
      A direct match to your aunt on chromosome 19 at 2,502,470 - 4,788,557,
      I’d love to know what you find ;o)
      Laura

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  4. You said that males will receive their Y-DNA haplogroup. Could you provide an example of that? Also, how many Y-DNA markers will the test cover. Do you know of any plans to be able to transfer the (Y-DNA) results over to FTDNA? If you do a report on someone's Y-DNA results, could you include a comparison to FTDNA Y-DNA tests? Thank you.

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    1. Debbie Kennett's blog gives an example of the Y-DNA results here: https://cruwys.blogspot.com/2017/01/my-living-dna-results-part-2-mtdna-and.html. I do not know of any plans to transfer the Y-SNPs to FTDNA.

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  5. Hi CeCe, I am adopted and have tested at Ancestry, FTDNA, and 23andMe as well as uploaded to DNA.LAND, GedMatch, and DNAgedcom. Since my non-ID information from my adoption file says that my birth mother's heritage was Welsh (and I have found out that her surname was Lewis and my highest matches all include Jones, Davis, and a couple of other Welsh surnames), I have been looking for a test to take that will specifically match me to the UK. I looked at the Cymru DNA Wales Project but it was expansive and didn't include any DNA Match list. You said that Living DNA Ancestry does not include match lists either (yet) and that you found that your results were not quite correct as far as you know. It appears as though one of my birth parents has Colonial roots so that might compound my test results. Would you recommend that I go ahead and take the Living DNA Ancestry test just to add to my knowledge (and hopefully, later to my match list)? What do you think about the Cymru DNA Wales Project?

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  6. Thanks, Cece. My recent ancestry is 100% British Isles and I have a particular mystery I'm hoping the Living DNA test might provide clues for. I just took advantage of the discounted price and I'm looking forward to the results.

    Kathleen Cooper

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    1. Hi Kathleen - I am also thinking of ordering this test. What would the discounted price be for this test? I see the website lists it for $$159 at the moment. Thanks!

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    2. That promotion has ended but I might be able to offer my followers a discount in the near future.

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  7. From my genealogy I should be ~75% Irish/Scots-Irish and 25% Danish. I took this test as an experiment to see if it breaks down my Irish descent regions. FYI, according to genealogy I should be 25% Danish.
    FTDNA breakdowns have changed over time to now show that I am British Isles 69%, Scandinavia 27%, Finland and Northern Siberia 2%, and Eastern European 1%.
    23andMe breakdown is British and Irish 54.7, Scandinavian 10.1%, French and German 8.1%, Finish 0.2%, 1%,
    Broadly Northwestern European 10.1%, Italian 0.5%, and Broadly Southern European 1.5%

    I can't wait to see what LivingDNA shows to see if it clarifies or confuses me. :)

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  8. Hi Cece,
    Thanks for this post. I really appreciated the "Technical Note" regarding Germanic and Anglia/SE UK populations. I have paper trails for my families in Ostfriesland Germany and Sweden back 6-7 generations with no English ancestors. In fact these farm people rarely moved. I have done several DNA tests that show recent UK enthnicity. Your explanation helps explain some of that perhaps. I am hoping you will do a post sometime expanding on this issue. Thanks for sharing your insights on you blogs!

    Jane

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  9. I have been rather disappointed with Living DNA, but perhaps your experience of this company depends on your expectation. So far I am unable to 'Download Results' as I get the message that 'This feature is currently being finalised. Please check back shortly.' When I emailed to ask about this I was told I should receive them 'this year'. As I have also ordered a book, which is promised some time soon, I am anticipating a disappointing, restricted report which is fairly generic. The LivingDNA email reply to my enquiry was also off-putting, with spelling errors that made it look unprofessional. It may well evolve over time, but my feeling is they probably went public too early, before all their systems were in place, and compared to 23&me and Ancestry DNA they don't impress - yet. Let's hope that future developments make a difference. Anne

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  10. Thank you for your message. I just ordered a kit from Living DNA, so I will let you know my experience with them. But it definitely helps to know what your experience was with them. Thank you! Jessica

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  12. Would this test be sufficient for ydna compared to ftdna? I am a male looking for bio father and have yet to do a ydna test. How many markers would this test have?

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    1. No, the only company that offers the Y-DNA specific test for matching purposes is Family Tree DNA. I would watch them for a DNA Day sale and order at least 37 markers. Good luck!

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  13. CeCe: Does LivingDNA give the customer access to the raw DNA files? How many SNP's are tested for the autosomal, mtDNA, YDNA and XDNA? There does not appear to any of this information on the company website or ISOGG. Thanks

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    1. There is an indepth comparison of SNPs and other aspects of DNA tests at the eupedia website https://www.eupedia.com/europe/dna_project_faq.shtml#Company

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  14. Thank you for the review! I'm about to get myself a kit as well. I hope they can get more accurate when it comes to break down Caucasian Middle Eastern genetic differences like Armenian, Turkic, Iranian, Arabian, Georgian etc. although I, realisticly spoken, can not expect that much of accuracy from any DNA testing company in the first place.

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  15. Hello there Cece, just ordered my LivingDNA test and the your samples are quite helpful. On 23andme and Ancestry DNA, my genetic cousins have been easy to trace so I don't have to worry as much about genetic mailmen at least. However I agree it's hard to trace Colonial roots and the samples are going to help me organize my ancestry. My ancestry is 15/32 British (13/32 Colonial American/1/16 Middlesex British), 3/16 German, 5/32 Irish, 1/8 Scots Gaelic, 1/16 French Canadian. As for LivingDNA's inaccuracy, you got to remember that LivingDNA is only 8 months old; that's younger than my puppy chihuahua even. I totally see improvement for the coming years but patience is a virtue. ;)

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  16. I just order Living DNA, just to see how it compares with my FtDNA results. The funny thing with the latter is that they recently redid all of the "origins"--my GG Grandfather was from Gibraltar and his parents, grandparents were from Italy, spain, and portugual. However, the first round of FtDNA had this in my DNA reults, but the redo it is completely gone, I am now 43% British, and 57% Western and Central Europe. My mix before was 76% British Isles and mix of several others, including Northern Africa (which includes parts of southern spain and italy. So Not sure what to believe now

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  17. Just got my results back and compared to AncestryDNA and 23andme. Living DNA gave me 78.8% Great Britain and Ireland, which should have been 16%-33%. No German, when I have 5%-35% on the other tests. But if the German is included in the GB&I% as you said above, that could explain it. It also shows 8.8% Turkey which was "low confidence - Caucasus" at 4% on Ancestry and could only be in Broadly Southern European on 23andme, which could also include my Italian heritage. Their estimation of Italian (Europe South) is just 4.4%, estimated at 10% on Ancestry and 4%-13% on 23andme. My test results don’t seem to have “a level of detail never seen before.” The examples on the website show things like South Italy, Northwest England, Southwest Scotland. Mine has Great Britain and Ireland, Europe (South), Europe (East), Europe (North and West). Not details, no further breakdown. Overall, I am underwhelmed with results from LivingDNA and would not recommend it to others at this time.

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  18. Decided to get a test. I'm at all 3 other sites, I'll be interested to see how this turns out. On paper I'm 65% German/French, 35% Irish/Scottish/English. Honestly if they pinpoint any English correctly I'd be impressed. I have very, very little known (1 5th-great grandfather who I cannot trace, but was at least partially English from MD; and 1 other 5th-great grandfather who was supposedly English from CT). Beyond that, there could be some small amount from English transplants in Ireland.

    I hope they can dive deeper on Ireland like they have in England at some point in the future.

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  19. I have done the test, my ancestors are all from Germany as far as i have found them. Only one family is said, has is origins in great britain in 10 generations, one in Luxembourg. What has Living DNA found out: my family is 100% European, 39,9% Great Britain and Ireland, 27,3% East Europe, 16,6% North and West Europe, 16,3 south europe. If i take a look at the maps, Germany belongs to North and West europe, also the east of germany where i am living belongs to east europe at the map. The southeast of anglia can also be Germanic pouplation.

    This is a little bit confusing for me, can anyone tell me, which of the other DNA Test i should take, to verify this?

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    1. Whatever you do don't do Living DNA, it's bad and lacks what a novice would like to see in simple terms. I spent $220 for the test & book and now I'm out of the cash. The book is a glossy reprint from your online report that includes mostly the high school level anthropology text book crap and only a few pages that refer to you. Could have just printed them out for pennies. Save your money, it's like you go to a 5 star restaurant and then the waiter brings over a MacDonald's Happy Meal, trust me you won't be happy with this company. Thanks, Marc

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  20. I'm impressed. If you're mostly UK you really want this test. My estimate was 98.7 UK and 1.3% Scandinavia while my records put the UK at 93% with 5.7% moving across the Dover Strait to The Netherlands and Germany. It will be interesting to see if the German update can improve this admitted difficult area. Another problem is Ireland, the PoBI did not sample central and southern Ireland so my Irish estimate was 6% while I expect 17%.It will be interesting when the Ireland Atlas Project is published next year and incorporated in Living DNA, my missing Irish may be found. Wales and Scotland agree with my paper records, percent and location by county. My paper records are weaker in England and Ireland so I'm hoping England and updated Ireland updates will help tracking down ancestors. In fact I'm testing my Mother and paternal aunt to shed more light on locations as they also should be 90%. Living DNA already is helpful and should be even better after next year's updates. However I can't speak of results for those with lower UK ancestry.

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  21. Great question! I have many of the same conflicts! SMH!

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  22. LivingDNA is running a $99. Sale currently

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  23. My twin brother and I have just submitted samples for DNA testing. He elected to use Ancestry DNA test and elected to use Living DNA. We are of Mexican descent and looking forward to getting our results. Besides native and Spanish ancestry, we have been told by our now deceased grandparents of Greek and Jewish ancestors. This should be interesting!! Will update when results are in. Joe G

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    1. Did you get your results back yet? Curious to see what you have for comparison.

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  24. I just received my results from Living dna and am totally disappointed with them. I did another with My heritage Dna and was happy with their analogy of the results. I wish I would have read the reviews here first before sites that offer ratings and right next to them links to go and buy them that's just website trying to make money from the companies they rate..Living dna in my opinion is a waste of money so do your self a favor and stay away from them.

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  25. That’s a very great article I like to read your all articles.

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  26. Have enjoyed reading your articles on the various aspects of genetic testing. Overall Ancestry did match my family tree closer than living DNA. The Ireland/Scotland/Wales were very close as was connection with Cornwall. My Grandfather born in North Wales (living DNA is 19.6% for North Wales) and my Grandmothers mother was born in Cornwall (27.3%) Great grandmother Devon (7%). I get the most DNA matches (ancestry, My Heritage, Familytree from Cornwall. Another grandmother is from Sweden where ancestry seems closer (Ancestry at 19%, Living DNA at 9%) and the same would be true with Northwestern Europe where ancestry is closer at 28% and Living DNA at 9%. I suspect some of the Eastern British cluster could reflect Northwestern Europe. Living DNA did pick up my Scotland heritage (Northwestern Scotland, Cumbria and Northumbria) . Would be significant if they offered DNA Matching. The combined British ancestry is a bit high compared to Ancestry (91%-43.7%), however familytree give 90% British and My Heritage give 73% British (gives 1.2% for Welch/Scottish/Irish). I have the birth certificate for my Welch grandfather and feel my tree is accurate so was nice to get confirmation of sorts on my Welch heritage as none of the other companies did (ancestry did give combined non-British). So overall was pleased with the results from Living DNA. It get a lot of Swedish matches from Familytree even though they do not show much Scandinavian ancestry (2% Findland) and get a lot of matches to folks with high Welch/Scottish/Irish % with My Heritage even though they only list 1.2% for that category. Don Bailey

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  27. CeCe, Have you heard or read anything recently regarding Living DNA's "family matches"? Jim

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  28. Wally Huskonen here. Today I received an email from Living DNA stating that my THIRD attempt at testing with Living DNA had failed. Here is the text of the email:

    Following on from the testing of your third sample, we are very sorry to have to tell you that this third attempt has also generated a LOW CALL RATE. What this means is that it has not been possible for us to identify up to 1% or approximately 6,800 marker locations within your DNA on that sample.

    We do know that some people will struggle to swab enough DNA to test. This is because they naturally do not shed enough cells when compared to others which makes it harder to extract enough DNA for testing.

    This is not a medical condition and unfortunately as a individual, you cannot increase your shed rate.

    Because we have worked with you to collect three samples and reduce errors in the collection method, we believe that a low shed rate may be the reason that there has not been enough DNA in your samples.

    Sadly, this means it is likely that we would not be able to get results for you with further testing and we have to say that we have reached the end of your journey with us.

    We understand that this is very disappointing news and that you have paid to receive your results, which will not be supplied.

    Because this is such a very rare occurrence we would like to offer you a refund for the cost of your testing.

    I have tested successfully with AncestryDNA (spit), MyHeritageDNA (swab) and FamilyTreeDNA (swab), but the Living DNA test (swab) was unseccesful in three tries. I was very careful to follow all the directions, including swabbing counterclockwise for the recommended, cautions about eating, etc.

    Go figure.

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