Seed Of Israel: Still Can't Recommend LivingDNA After Update

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In this video I’m going to talk about how I still cannot recommend LivingDNA after receiving the recent ancestry update. The problem is that South Italy has a lot of Levantine. I should not be getting more North Turkey and Arabia than Levant. Also my results are vastly different than my parents. The LivingDNA algorithm still needs a lot of work in my view. My updated results:

South Italy 51.3%
Northeast Europe 15.7%
North Turkey 14.5%
Arabia 10.6%
Levant 6.3%
North Africa 1.5%

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LivingDNA

Population structure of modern-day Italians reveals patterns of ancient and archaic ancestries in Southern Europe

[claudiofrezza]

If you take into account Cypriots are 40% Levantine base + plus Aegean/Anatolian, On Average the various full Ashkenazim LivingDNA customers are Scoring around 45% Middle Eastern which in itself is a positive, only Negative is that from so many areas other than Levant, especially South Caucasus and Cyprus.
That being said I have seen the results of a Iraqi Arab who also scored huge amount of South Caucasus, I image when we start seeing Lebanese customers results they too will score largely from South Caucasus lesser than expected from Levantine, and yes I agree South Italian is eating into your Levantine but the question is why? Just because of the Levantine ancestry in south Italy or because Ashkenazi Jews genuinely have to a lesser extent south Italian ancestry?
Without Judging LivingDNA too harshly they did announce that this update was a european update not Middle Eastern.
LivingDNA DNA are actually in the process of sampling the Middle East, they actually announced a year or two ago “The Middle East Project” a 5 year intensive sampling project of the Middle East, so hopefully once that sampling project is over we will see a huge update and a more accurate interpretation of Western Jews Levantine ancestry.

[joeflores]

I think living DNA is an excellent Spanish and less than a 1/5 native American" and that is exactly what living DNA gave me

[Seahorse]

I mainly got South Caucasus for my Middle Eastern results. I also got Arabia ( which represents my Sephardic ancestry, along with West Iberia ).

I have read many studies on where we cluster on PCA charts. While we mainly cluster with Southern Italians, we also cluster with Armenians, and Georgians. M.A Aram Yardumian in A Tale of Two Hypotheses: Genetics and the Ethnogenesis of Ashkenazi Jewry, writes “Eastern European Jews share a substantial and unique portion of their genes with Georgian and Armenian populations...but not with Eastern European populations at large”. I only got 7.4% Northeastern Europe ( Poland, Slovakia, Moravia, Belarus, and Ukraine), even though a substantial proportion of bloodline is from that region. Yardumian also writes “we are left not with a link between Eastern European Jews and Khazars, but between Eastern European Jews and Armenians and Georgians, which in itself warrants an explanation lest we are drawn into envisioning a South Caucasus based origin for Eastern European Jewry”.

Before the 2020 updates my results were primarily Southern Italy, with some Tuscan and Levantine. As of the 2020

[Seahorse]

I like the fact that you looked at the article on Italian genes. There is one thing incorrect about the article, and that is that Northern Italians cluster closer to Western Europe. PCA charts show that Northern Italians plot further south than both Romanians and Bulgarians. They also plot much further south than Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. North Italians cluster closer to Greeks than French. Razib Khan in his article Genetics and the Jews noted there is even some overlap with Ashkenazi Jews and North Italians. I got Northern Italy in my Southern Europe results. The article Northern Italians are biologically Southern European, explodes the myth that Northern Italians are Celts and Teutons. Northern Italians are further from Germans and Dutch than Eastern Europeans on PCA charts. Here is a list of proximity to Western and Northern Europeans among Southern Europeans. Closest are Basques who fall just South of the divide line, followed by East Iberians ( Catalans, and Eastern Spaniards ), West Iberians ( Galicians, Western Spaniards, and Portuguese), Northern Italians, Sardinians, Tuscans, Albanians, Greeks, and Southern Italians.

I agree with you that a lot of your Levantine is swallowed up by Southern Italy. Before the 2020 updates I was heavily Southern Italian, with a much lower Middle East percentage, but since the upgrade my Middle Eastern results have skyrocketed.

Sephardic Jews can cluster close to Saudis. I have some Sephardic ancestry, hence I get Arabia in my updated results. It’s possible that you have some Sephardic heritage. I got West Iberia, which also represents my Sephardic ancestry. West Iberia has a North African genetic influence, unlike East Iberia.

[sahlemus]

Have there been any updates since? If so, could you please make a video on it?

[DaesungMars]

I'm also fully Ashkenazi and my highest percentage was 43.3% South Caucasus. Do you have any idea what that's about?

[nicolasnovotny]

What is your maternal and paternal haplogroup?