Cite Us

When publishing, please cite:

A "Copernican" Reassessment of the Human Mitochondrial DNA Tree from its Root.
Behar DM, van Oven M, Rosset S, Metspalu M, Loogväli EL, Silva NM, Kivisild T, Torroni A, Villems R; Am J Hum Genet. 2012.
American Journal of Human Genetics.

Terms of Use and Disclaimer

The mtDNACommunity.org website and utilities are provided by the copyright holders and contributors "as is" and without any express or implied warranties, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose. In no event shall mtDNACommunity.org, the copyright owners, contributors, staff and consultants of Gene by Gene, Ltd. be liable for any direct, indirect, incidental, special, exemplary, or consequential damages (including, but not limited to, procurement of substitute goods or services; loss of use, data, or profits; or business interruption) however caused and on any theory of liability, whether in contract, strict liability, or tort (including negligence or otherwise) arising in any way out of the use of this website and utilities, even if advised of the possibility of such issues. mtDNACommunity.org website and utilities are not to be used for any commercial purpose of any kind and any such violation will give mtDNACommunity.org, the copyright owners, contributors, staff and consultants of Gene by Gene, Ltd. the right to seek all remedies available by law.

Terms and conditions before being able to create an account in mtDNACommunity:

Welcome to www.mtDNAcommunity.org. Recently, a Reconstructed Sapiens Reference Sequence (RSRS), representing the inferred root haplotype of the human mtDNA phylogeny, was proposed as an evolutionary valid alternative for the revised Cambridge Reference Sequence (rCRS) and published by the American Journal of Human Genetics 2012 Apr 6;90(4):675-84: A "Copernican" reassessment of the human mitochondrial DNA tree from its root. The suggested change aims to facilitate the understanding of core evolutionary principles in general and the handling of mtDNA data in particular.

Among other things, the website aims to improve and support the genealogical experience by allowing each of you to create a personal page with personal components that can be kept anonymously or publicly shared. The website functions under the following guidelines:

1. www.mtDNACommunity.org is a free public service for anyone to use. For users manually uploading their sequence, we do ask for responsible and accurate submissions of data.
2. The website supports only complete mtDNA sequences.
3. By creating a password protected personal page you will be able to post your complete mtDNA sequence in multiple ways and fill in additional fields related to your personal genealogical information. Important: uploading your sequence does not mean that you will be uploading your personal information; as mentioned above, once the sequence has been uploaded you will be able to create a personal page with personal components that can be kept anonymously or publicly shared.
4. Next, you will be able to choose which of the personal fields you will want to publicly share, if any. While the website will allow you to use its various tools, your sequence will not be included in the phylogeny unless you have checked the appropriate boxes.
5. Each submitted sequence will be noted as verified or not-verified. Verified sequences are sequences that were published as part of a peer reviewed paper or sequences that were privately obtained for which the mtDNACommunity staff can verify the original chromates. Family Tree DNA customers can upload their sequence automatically from their personal pages and will be automatically marked as verified. Sequences uploaded manually will be reviewed by the mtDNACommunity team, which will remove false or inaccurate results.
6. Your privacy is a major concern of ours. mtDNACommunity staff will not upload your sequence to NCBI or use it in any publication as a result of you choosing to release your data publicly. If you have directly submitted your complete mtDNA sequence to NCBI, we suggest including this information among your personal details to avoid duplicated annotations of the same sequence in mtDNACommunity. It is important to note that by uploading your sequence to mtDNACommunity, you are making your data publicly available. You can withdraw your submission at your will. However, because www.mtdnacommunity.org is a public database that is distributed and downloadable by users worldwide, you need to be aware that even if you remove the record from the database after it has been publicly released, it would still remain in other third party databases. Also, note that if your submission has triggered a topological change to the human mtDNA phylogeny, this topological change cannot be undone.
7. We welcome your comments and suggestions for further improvements and corrections. Please address them to info@mtDNACommunity.org. While we will take action based on the relevance of the information provided, please do not expect a reply.

Thank you again for being part of the scientific campaign meant to enrich our knowledge of the human mtDNA phylogeny. We hope that you will find mtDNACommunity helpful and we ask you to follow its evolution.