Ethnic DNA Testing

DNA testing has far reaching implications. It is being used not just for serious purposes like forensic science but also to determine the ethnicity of individuals. A particular company, marketing its tests to determine the ethnicity of people calls it recreational genomics. These tests have become extremely common these days and are being employed by a large number of people.

Some companies use SNP tests to confirm the ethnicity of a person. SNP's are the positions on the DNA where one nucleotide has mutated to another nucleotide. They provide information about the percentage influence of a particular ethnic group in a person. Various companies provide this information based on their own criteria. Some of them divide it into several categories while some companies use only a few ethnic groups as the background. The accuracy of these tests still remains controversial and can not be relied upon completely.

STR is another technology that is frequently employed to provide information about the ethnic background of a person. STR's are defined as locations on chromosomes where two or more nucleotide patterns are repeated. Also, these repetitions are generally adjacent to each other. However, the results of an STR test vary from those of SNP tests as they do not depend upon bio-geographic divisions of the world. The STR tests are more useful in cases where intra group relations are to be established. In cases where inter group relations have to be determined, these tests have serious limitations.

In males, Y chromosome sampling is carried out to determine their ethnicity. This testing is more reliable because only males have this chromosome. All males of a particular family have more or less similar pattern on their Y chromosome.

However, these tests are not completely accurate all the time. The traces of an ancestor, several generations back, may not show up. On other occasions a very little percentage of some ethnic group character may actually be a false indicator. These tests may even spur the already prevalent gap between different races. In a society like America that is already multi racial, these tests may provide a spark of hatred for another group.

Also, people are using these tests for their own private gains. A leading daily noted that a person with a slight Jewish ancestry trace claimed Israeli citizenship on the basis of that. Others are successfully using it to gain admissions to the colleges in minority category or to stake their claims to property.

Although these tests reveal a lot of information about a person, a certain ethical code should be created for people performing these tests to avoid its misuse. People deciphering their ethnic origins should also be prevented from using this for personal gains.