Humanities and Social Sciences

Dr. Turi King
University of Leicester

In Britain, the use of hereditary surnames was brought over by the Normans in 1066. Surnames are passed down through the generations down through the paternal line and this trannsmission of a name is mirrored by a segment of DNA known as the Y chromosome. The question to be answered then was, do all men with the same surname have the same Y chromosome type, having been passed down through the generations hand in hand. Dr. King will discuss how DNA fingerprinting has been used as a way to trace surnames down through the generations, to prove links between families who didn’t know they were related or to show that a particular surname may have more than one origin. She will also talk about his genetic genealogy is now a booming business and some famous cases she’s been involved in including her work on Sir David Attenborough’s family and that of Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States.

Dr Turi King is an Anglo-Canadian who read Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Cambridge before moving into the field of genetics at the University of Leicester where she gained a distinction for her MSc and later carried out her award-winning PhD research. Her work combines genetics with history, archaeology, geography, and forensics. She is best known for leading the genetic analysis in the King Richard III case.