Background. In 2005, Peter and Marilyn went to Heidi's wedding in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. After the wedding, they visited Mount Rushmore with Micki and Johnny Varro and Marilyn's cousin Carroll and Mike. They met Michael McDonnel, Marilyn's third cousin, once removed, who happens to live in Sioux Falls. In 2012, Michael had his Y-DNA tested. He is descended a group called Cenel Moain, a subset of Cenel Eoghain, a subset of Northwest Irish (M222). See: Deep Ancestry: Genealogy and DNA.

Michael's Y-DNA is a SNP called BY216377. It was born in 1150 AD in Ulster. It has Celtic ancestry.

• L21, 2600 BC, Southern England. Celtic
• Z2965, 1550 BC, England
• M222, 50 BC, Ulster. Fist branch in 1,500 years. Referred to as Irish Type I and Northwest Irish. See M222 project
• DF104, 150 AD, Ulster. See: DF104 project
• S588, 300 AD, Ulster. This is the SNP of Cenel Eoghain, descendants of Eógan mac Néill who died in 465 AD. See: Cenel Eoghain project
• S603, 350 AD, Ulster
• FGC57780, 600 AD, Ulster. This is the SNP of Cenel Moain. Major surnames are Gormley, Graham, McAnally, Kelly, McAleer
• FGC23592, 650 AD, Ulster
• FT120288, 050 AD, Ulster
• BY216377, 1150 AD, Ulster
• BY18200. 1600 AD. Ulster. Michael McDonnel shares this SNP with a tester named McAuley

Our oldest known ancestor with this DNA is Marilyn's great, great, great grandfather, Daniel McDonald, born in 1818 in Ireland (1850 and 1860 census) or Scotland (1870 and 1880 census). Sometime before 1836, Daniel immigrated to White Hall, New York. The tester was Michael McDonnel, Marilyn's third cousin, once removed. See: Third Cousins.

Michael McDonnel is kit number 252843. His DNA can be found in several projects at FTDNA: M222 project, DF104 project, and Cenel Eoghain project.

SNP Age. SNPs occur randomly. The number of SNPs can vary a lot by tester. On average over a large population for a long time period, some have estimated that Big Y SNPs might occur every 83 years.

BIG Y. BIG Y is a testing program offered by Family Tree DNA that tests a large part of the Y-chromosome. It identifies a man's SNPs (single nucleotide polymorphisms) and compares those SNPs with other men it has tested. The FGC23592 BIG Y SNP Tree includes the SNPs of all men who have been tested under the BIG Y program and have the FGC23592 SNP. Testers have downloaded their raw results from their FTDNA homepage.

Map of M222 (50 BC). Source: Migration Map for M222.

Michael's DNA group can be seen on Ken Graham's Chart and Micheal McNally's Chart. Aidan Byrne maintains a Facebook page for the S603 Community. A history of Cenel Moain can be found in Familia 1990: Ulster Genealogical Review, Number 6

Surname Projects. In addition to the M222, DF104, and S588 projects, all are encouraged to join their surname project.

R-FGC57780 Cenel Moain Big Y SNP Tree

The following pointers will help to navigate the Breassal Breac Big Y SNP Tree shown in the window below.

1. SNPs. SNPs (e.g., FGC57780 Cenel Moain) are single nucleotide polymorphisms, or mutations, found on the Y chromosome of male BIG Y testers. SNPs that are inherited by two or more testers allow the creation of tree branches with named SNPs.
2. Discover More. Click on a SNP in the tree below to see Family Tree DNA's story of the SNP, including the estimated year that it was born.
3. Testers. After each SNP are the names of Big Y testers whose DNA named the SNP.

R-FGC57780 Cenel Moain Big Y SNP Tree

About the Tree. The tree shows Y-chromosome SNPs of Cenel Moain Big Y testers. Big Y is a Y-chromosome testing program offered by Family Tree DNA since 2014. It identifies a man's SNPs (single nucleotide polymorphisms) and compares those SNPs with other men it has tested. The Breassal Breac Big Y SNP Tree includes the SNPs of all Breassal Breac members who have been tested under the Family Tree DNA Big Y program, which tests a large part of the Y-chromosome.

The tree is based on FTDNA's Big Y Block Tree, which is accessible by each Big Y tester from his homepage at FTDNA.

Michael Sager of FTDNA maintans a Public Y-DNA Haplotree. Tester surnames are shown if two or more kits allow public project profile sharing and have the same surname spelling. Learn about the tree at: Public Y-DNA Haplotree

For a summary of Big Y, see the FTDNA Big Y Q&A.

SNPs are either named or unnamed.

• Unnamed SNPs have a 7 or 8 digit number based on their position on the Build 37 human reference genome. The letters indicate the nature of the mutation, e.g. from C to T.
• Named SNPs have been given a short name to make them easieer to remember. If you wave over them with your cursor, you will see the longer SNP designation. SNP names start with letters.
  • "A" SNPs were named by Thomas Krahn. See the YSEQ SNP Index.
  • "AM" or "AMM" SNPs were named by the Laboratory of Forensic Genetics and Molecular Archaeology, UZ Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
  • "BY" SNPs were found with Big Y at Family Tree DNA. See the BY SNP Index.
  • "CTS" SNPs were named by Chris Tyler-Smith of the The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Hinxton, England.
  • "DF" SNPs were named by an anonymous researcher using publicly available full-genome-sequence data, including 1000 Genomes Project data; named in honor of the DNA-Forums.org genetic genealogy community.
  • "F" SNPs were named by Li Jin at Fudan University in China.
  • "FGC" SNPs were named by Full Genomes Corporation of Virginia and Maryland.
  • "FT," "FTA," and "FTB" SNPs were found with Big Y-700 at Family Tree DNA. See the FT SNP Index.
  • "L" SNPs were named by Thomas Krahn in honor of the late Leo Little.
  • "M" SNPs were named by Peter Underhill, Ph.D., of Stanford University.
  • "PF" SNPs were named by Paolo Francalacci at the Università di Sassari in Italy.
  • "S" SNPs were named at ScotlandsDNA by James F. Wilson, D.Phil, Edinburgh University.
  • "SK" SNPs were named by Mark Stoneking, Ph.D., Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, Germany
  • "V" SNPs were named by Rosaria Scozzari and Fulvio Cruciani, Dipartimento di Biologia e Biotecnologie “Charles Darwin,” Sapienza Università di Roma, Rome, Italy
  • "Y" SNPs were named by the YFull Team using data from the 1000 Genomes Project.
  • "Z" SNPs were assigned by the Community.
  • "ZZ" SNPs were named by Alex Williamson. Mutations in palindromic regions. Each ZZ prefix represents two possible SNP locations