Researchers Map Ancestry And Population Migration Through DNA

By Dr. Brian McDonough, Medical Editor

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - Move over all of you ancestry-related web sites. Tracking down family history may have just moved beyond old photos, documents and ship registries.

Researchers from Oxford University and the University College of London have created an interactive genetic map that reveals the origins of different populations around the world.

This is pretty amazing: they collected the DNA of almost 1500 people from 95 different populations across Europe, Africa, Asia, and South America. They then examined shared DNA between different populations and found two major things: migration patterns around our planet and how much other populations contributed to current ones.

Not surprisingly, this often matched documented historic events. The article in the journal Science talked about merchant trade that occurred between Greece and China in the 13th century and how it led to the current population in China.

According to the authors, the map is a visually stunning way to help people trace their roots.