Professor Sykes used samples from 61 volunteers who shared his surname to establish a link between the name and the distinctive DNA. He has found similar results for three other names, but thinks the link may not hold for the most common surnames like Jones and Smith.
Half of the group shared four unique sections of DNA which were not found in control subjects either in Yorkshire or anywhere in the UK.
The name Sykes means a boundary stream and is a common landscape feature in Yorkshire, suggesting a number of people could have adopted it in the 13th and 14th centuries, when inherited surnames became common.
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