There are several types of DNA testing. The two that are used for our Kilcoyne Study is the male only Y-DNA test and the autosomal DNA test. The autosomal test can be found on sites like ancestry, My Heritage, 23 and Me , and several others. It is recommended you test with Ancestry, because they have the largest database, and you can transfer your DNA file from ancestry to several other testing sites for free if you wish to. This test is wonderful for family matching within 200 years. The male only Y-DNA test looks only at the male inherited Y-Chromosome. The Y is passed from father to son relatively unchanged from generation to generation. Going back all the way to "Genetic Adam" a few hundred thousand years ago. There are occasional mutations along the Y that occur in specific men called single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPS) and short tandem repeats (STRs) These mutations allow us to track our ancestors through time. It is unknown to Science why these mutations occur, they are essentially evolutionarily hiccups.
The Haplotree, also called the Tree of Mankind, has 60k branches on it compiled from YDNA testers on sites like Family Tree DNA and several others. DNA that is sequenced from archeological sites are also included on the Haplotree. YDNA is essentially a time machine that allows us to see where in the world our male ancestors came from and migrated to. The mutations are also valuable in our family trees within the last few hundred years. Through advanced testing of specific lineages, I have found specific mutations in named men in our family trees. Valuable because we can place a tester on a specific farm where the mutation was created.
FTDNA is the oldest site and also has surname projects that you can join and is home to our Kilcoyne YDNA Project that I administer. Through this site and our Facebook group I have been able to recruit several dozen Kilcoyne men for Y-DNA testing. I have discovered ten paternally unrelated Kilcoyne families in the west of Ireland. I believe there are four primary Kilcoyne families with the other six making up non paternal events through adoption, females passing their Kilcoyne surname onto their child, or by other means. Having established these groups using YDNA , it is relatively easy to find which parish your Kilcoyne family came from. I have connected several families from America and England to their ancestral parishes in Mayo and Sligo. It is a very powerful tool we have at our disposal to reconnect our family trees. Many of us know how difficult it is to research our Irish family tree due to the limits of paper genealogy.
Here is an example of the Tubbercury-Kilcoynes genetic history traced back to central Africa 200k years ago. The SNPS here listed like R-L21 are actual men in our tree. Traced to these locations through all YDNA testing to date.
