Genographic Project · Lablypedia

The final phase of the project was Geno 2.0 Next Generation.

Upon retirement of the site, 1,006,543 participants in over 140 countries had joined the project.

Project history

Beginnings

In 2005, project director Spencer Wells created and then led the Genographic Project, which was a privately funded, not-for-profit collaboration among the National Geographic Society, IBM, and the Waitt Foundation. Field researchers at eleven regional centers around the world began by collecting DNA samples from indigenous populations.

In the fall of 2012, the Genographic Project announced the completion of a new genotyping array, dedicated to genetic anthropology, called GenoChip. GenoChip was specifically designed for anthropological testing and included SNPs from autosomal DNA, X-chromosome DNA, Y-chromosome DNA, and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). The design of the new chip was a collaborative effort among Wells of National Geographic, Eran Elhaik of Johns Hopkins, Family Tree DNA, and Illumina.

The autosomal admixture analysis developed by Wells and Elhaik classified individuals by assessing their proportions of genomic ancestry related to nine ancestral regions: Northeast Asian; Mediterranean; Southern African; Southwest Asian; Oceanian; Southeast Asian; Northern European; Sub-Saharan African; and Native American.

In August 2015, a new chip was designed as a joint effort between Vilar, who was the Genographic Lead Scientist, and Family Tree DNA.

In the fall of 2015, Miguel Vilar took over leadership of the Project.

Geno 2.0 Next Generation

In 2016, the project began utilizing cutting-edge Helix DNA sequencing for a new phase of the Genographic Project called Geno 2.0 Next Generation.

Whereas earlier phases used 9 regional affiliations, Geno 2.0 Next Generation analyzed modern-day indigenous populations around the world using either 18 or 22 regional affiliations.

Utilizing a DNA-collection kit, Helix would acquire a saliva sample from a participant, which would then be analyzed for genomic identifiers that were designed to offer unprecedented insight into a person's genetic origins. The data would then be uploaded to the Genographic Project DNA database.

Endings

In the spring of 2019, it was announced that the Geno project had ended, but results would remain available online until 2020.

In July 2020, the site was retired.

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Legacy

For the duration of the initiative, from 2005 to 2019, Genographic engaged volunteers (in fieldwork and providing DNA samples) and citizen science projects. During this time the National Geographic Society sold non-profit self-testing kits to members of the general public who wished to participate in the project as "citizen scientists". Such outreach for public participation in research has been encouraged by organizations such as International Society of Genetic Genealogy (ISOGG), which is seeking to promote benefits from scientific research. This includes supporting, organization and dissemination of personal DNA (genetic) testing

The ISOGG has supported citizen participation in genetic research, and believes such volunteers have provided valuable information and research to the professional scientific community.

In 2013, Spencer Wells gave a speech to the Southern California Genealogical Society, in which he highlighted its encouragement of citizen scientists:

Since 2005, the Genographic Project has used the latest genetic technology to expand our knowledge of the human story, and its pioneering use of DNA testing to engage and involve the public in the research effort has helped to create a new breed of "citizen scientist". Geno 2.0 expands the scope for citizen science, harnessing the power of the crowd to discover new details of human population history.

Criticism

In April 2005, shortly after the announcement of the project, the Indigenous Peoples Council on Biocolonialism (IPCB) noted its connections to controversial issues (such as concern among some tribes that the results of genetic human migration studies might indicate that Native Americans are not indigenous to North America). The IPCB recommended against indigenous people participating.

The founder of IPCB, Debra Harry, offered a rationale for why Indigenous people were discouraged to participate in the Genographic Project. According to Harry, a Northern Paiute Native American and Associate Professor in Indigenous Studies at Nevada University, the Genographic Project resulted in a human genetic testing practice that appeared to mask an ulterior motive rather than mere scientific research. Particularly, the great concern about the possible political interest behind the Genographic Project, motivated the IPCB to preemptively alert the global indigenous community on the "not so altruistic motivations" of the project. Additionally, IPCB argued that the Genographic project not only provided no direct benefit to Indigenous peoples, but instead raised considerable risks. Such risks, raised by Harry in an interview released in December 2005, were used to advocate against the indigenous participation in the project.

Another argument, made by IPCB founder Debra Harry, was that the Genographic Project served as a method to discredit kin relations through the possibility that ancestral identities might be invalidated and misused to deny Indigenous peoples’ access and authority over the resource-rich territories that they had for long inhabited.

The IPCB also suggested that another attempt at biocolonialism in the Genographic Project involved the high probability of genetic testing results producing statistical errors, such as false negatives and positives leading to the misidentification of Native people as non-Native and vice versa.

TallBear expressed that another possible negative consequence might be the risk that an individual's cultural identity would be conclusively established through biocolonialist projects such as the Genographic Project. Ultimately, TallBear's argument was viewed as in close agreement with Harry's concerns regarding the Genographic Project, serving as a significant force motivating IPCB to advocate against Biocolonialism.

In May 2006, the project came to the attention of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII). UNPFII conducted investigations into the objectives of the Genographic Project, and recommended that National Geographic and other sponsors suspend the project. Concerns were that the knowledge gleaned from the research could clash with long-held beliefs of indigenous peoples and threaten their cultures. There were also concerns that indigenous claims to land rights and other resources could be threatened.

As of December 2006, some federally recognized tribes in the United States declined to take part in the study including Maurice Foxx, chairman of the Massachusetts Commission on Indian Affairs and a member of the Mashpee Wampanoag.

Not all Indigenous peoples agree with his position; as of December 2012, more than 70,000 indigenous participants from the Americas, Africa, Asia, Europe, and Oceania had joined the project.