I’ve had numerous folks tell me their DNA test results seemed to differ from those of their parents, and even siblings. There’s good reason for that. We get the genes that we inherit, half from each of our parents. However, there’s a process called recombination that takes place following conception, meaning that each egg and each sperm carries a different mix of a parent’s genes – thus testing results differ. Following is an except from an interesting article which was posted the first of February on the KQED website.
Maybe you got one of those find-your-ancestry kits over the holidays. You’ve sent off your awkwardly-collected saliva sample, and you’re awaiting your results. If your experience is anything like that of me and my mom, you may find surprises — not the dramatic “switched at birth” kind, but results that are really different from what you expected.
