23andMe, a California-based company, offers a web-based service that helps you read and understand your DNA. After providing a saliva sample using an at-home kit, you can use their interactive tools to find out who your ancestors were. That will cost you $999 (see Resources below).
Your spit kit will arrive in the mail. Spit into the sample and mail it back in the overnight envelope provided by 23andMe. Don't worry about the integrity of your sample since a preservative agent is included. Also, whether you are 30 or 70, the results will be the same and you'll be able to trace your heritage back through the generations, discovering everything from whether your ancestors had freckles to if you're prone to develop MS. "We take a holistic approach," says company science writer Andro Hsu, who touts the "ancestry painting" feature as one of many intuitive, visually-striking ways of analyzing one's information. This feature is designed to help users trace their chromosomal ancestry back by thousands of years, delving into the signatures of your 22 numbered chromosomes (in other words, all but X and Y). It's fascinating to detect whether your DNA has most likely descended from the Middle East, Europe or Africa, for example.
Send the sample back and wait. This could be difficult if you are the antsy type. Meanwhile, you might think about reading some books such as those of Craig Venter or James Watson. Venter's was the first ever full-on genome sequenced in the human species. Watson received the Nobel prize for helping to reveal the structure of DNA. His most recent book, "Avoid Boring [Other] People" (Alfred A. Knopf, 2007) is a great read, offering insight into the competitive world of young geneticists.
Once the email from 23andMe arrives (this takes about 4 to 6 weeks), your results are ready to view. Several pages of screen shots will provide a nice visual as well as a text explanation of what it all means.
Share your results with your friends, if you like. The testing is anonymous, since in this age of healthcare companies perhaps declining to cover us due to our family histories of mental illness or cancer, guarding one's information makes very good sense. Even so, 23andMe's spokeswoman Rachel Cohen assures that the technology used in compiling data is extremely secure.