DNA Day Miracle Boy Turns 6

Last night I had my last bedtime story read to me by a 5 year old grandson. Today he turns 6. Because of current social distancing protocols, this bedtime story was shared through social media. Benj calls these his "Gerald" books. Some of you will know them as Mo Willems' award winning "Elephant and Piggie" series. For the uninitiated among my readers, Gerald is the elephant and apparently the favorite of Benj. Those of you with sharp eyes will see Gerald on my tablet below along with the top of the head of a still 5 year old.

Benj reads "Gerald" book to Papa with a little tech assist from Daddy

Some of you may remember some of the story of how he came to be and why I called him our DNA Day Miracle when he was born in 2014. If you've heard all this before, please indulge a proud Papa as he tells it again.  

My youngest grandson was first DNA tested BEFORE he was implanted into his mom. Since then he has been tested twice via swabs long before they became front page news everyday. He attempted a spit test but quickly demonstrated that he was too young. Every time he was asked to spit, instead he blew his nose. We will try that again very soon.  

A few years ago I tested his two older brothers who where then 7 and 9. When I was discussing the results with them, Noah observed, "If we tested Benj, his results would be more like mine than Simon's." I think his conclusion was based more on observations of phenotype than on genomic data. Never the less, ever eager to encourage interest in genetic genealogy, I made a deal with Noah. If he would follow Benj around for 45 minutes or so and make sure he didn't consume any food or drink, I would swab him to test Noah's hypothesis. Noah kept his part of the bargain and so did I. 

I could understand that based on hair alone, Noah's conclusion had merit. He and Benj shared straight hair and the patented Papa Dowell cowlick. Simon's hair is a little curlier for reasons we will explore below. 

The DNA test results were a revelation to me in one significant regard. Benj only inherited 15% of his atDNA from his maternal grandfather. Prior to this I had bought into the theory that we each inherited 25% of our atDNA from each grandparent. As I was to learn, we inherit 50% of our atDNA from each SET of grandparents but the amount we get from each individual grandparent can vary widely. Benj got 35% from his maternal grandmother. Simon's inheritance was more balanced getting 26% from his maternal grandfather and Noah 22%. Simon also inherited 24.1% of his atDNA from his paternal grandmother -- another potential source of curly hair -- compared to 21.7% for Noah and 22.6% for Benj. A fuller analysis of all this is another story for another day.

More to my main theme today, Benj probably got so little of his atDNA from his maternal grandfather because of his first DNA test when he was an 8 cell embryo. The purpose of that test was to select a healthy embryo that did not carry his maternal grandfather's potentially fatal Brugada gene. 

For those of you who are interested there was a 2 part special blog post that I wrote on DNA Day 6 year ago to explain why that day was so special to our family:

Part 1: Autosomal Dominant Inheritance: Brugada Syndrome.

Part 2: Our DNA Day Miracle.  

In lieu of the traditional birthday party today Benj will be getting a noisy surprise drive by from his friends at 10:30 this morning. I hope Mother Nature cooperates and does not rain on his parade which will go on rain or shine. After the conclusion of that honking and yelling event, Benj will have 6 more "Gerald" books to read with Papa. 

Dowell brothers and nanny observing social distancing [from Grandpa] while Benj warms up to celebrate birthday.

Inheriting atDNA from 3rd Great-grandparents

Recently I have transferred to or tested about three dozen extended family members at MyHeritage. The recent upgrading of the tools by MyHeritage has moved the company's DNA services into the 21st century. If you haven't taken a look in the last month, you owe it to yourself to do so.

About a week ago I discovered a match from Germany for the maternal grandmother of my three Dowell grandsons. 

Those of you who are perceptive genetic genealogists will recognize that this amount of shared atDNA is well within the bullseye of what 2nd cousins would be expected to share. It also could be on the fringe of what could be expected if the two were one generation removed from each other within their families.

Particularly since my in law had been born in Germany, this appeared to be a match well worth pursuing. My interest was intensified when I discovered that "Weirauch" was one of the family surnames listed by the match.

Looking farther down the match list, I found my daughter-in-law:

 

She matched her mother as a daughter and shared a little less than half the atDNA her mother did. This would be about what we would expect because she was a generation farther removed from the matched individual.

Continuing down the match list I discovered my three Dowell grandsons. They were listed based on the amount of atDNA they shared with their maternal grandmother since it was her account I was using for this investigation. Those of you who read my blog posts a few months ago about how each of my grandsons inherited their atDNA from each of their four grandparents will not be surprised that MyHeritage reported their match with her ranged from almost 35% down to just over 23%. 

The boys are second cousins -- twice removed since the match is a second cousin of their grandmother. As such they would be expected to share about as much atDNA as third cousins and they do. However, I was surprised to find that the grandson who shared the most atDNA with his maternal grandmother, shared the least of the three with her second cousin. This is one more example to remind us of the random nature of atDNA inheritance. I guess I should learn not to assume predictability and just observe the data. 

Yes, this did turn out to be grandma's second cousin with whom communications had been lost when part of the family immigrated to America. A reunion is in the works that will include the grandparents, the parents and the grandsons during their spring school holiday in a few weeks. 

The source of the matching at DNA:

The connection of my grandsons with their newly discovered second cousin --twice removed is through a common descent from Max Weiranch (1878-1923) and Paulene Mittman (1878-1934) who were both born and died in Brieg, Schlesien. Max and Paulene were the boy's 3rd great-grandparents and between them they made a contribution that lives on in each of the boy's atDNA.

Benjamin

Noah

Simon

Each grandson inherited an identifiable and similar but different pattern of atDNA from this set of 3rd great-grandparents.