2025: The Year of AI
2025 will go down in the annals of the American economy as the year of AI. Unlike most other businesses, however, DNA Consultants made a decision early on at the highest levels to avoid use of AI in the writing of DNA reports, customer communications, and marketing and product comunications. The reasons are self-evident. We have always been committed to value-added customization and personalization of DNA results. AI is anything but individualized and thoughtful. If used in research, what part of the work is AI and what part is original, sourced to named publications?
Years ago, when other genetic companies were big into percentages of ethnicities, we solidified our position as a leading forensic ancestry company, asking the rhetorical question, “Do you want to be descended from an algorithm or an ancestor?” Since then, we have only grown in our customer base and number of employees. By contrast, one large direct-to-the-consumer DNA company had to downsize and faced bankrupcy, partly because of a business model that relied on robotic rather than human resources.
Today, we are proud of our continuing commitment to the practice of ethical, accurate and transparent science. You need never fear the invisible hand of AI in our output, just as you will never see unacknowledged or copyright-infringing material in any of our publications. AI disguised as one’s own work is cheating, as much as a term paper cribbed from Google AI mode is a serious form of plagiarism.
Book publishers today are right to ask how much of your manuscriipt is AI and how much your own work, as they could face legal fines, take-down judgments and damage to their reputations as “legacy” publishers if use of AI were not disclosed. There are several easy-to-use AI detectors, many of them free or at least low cost. Originality.AI, GPTZero, Copyleaks, Winston AI, and Grammarly detect AI in sample passages from any copy. The first paragraph of the present news release (above) was submitted to GPTZero and, out of the three possibilities of AI, Mixed and Human, was verified in a few seconds as 100% human, with 0% AI-generated content. The GPTZero robot told us, “We are highly confident this text is entirely human.” Thank you, Robbie.
Here is a round-up of some of the big events of the past year for our company and our customers:
1. Under development for about 10 years, Donald Yates’s latest book, The Countercurrents of Prehistory, was published by DNA Consultants and Panther’s Lodge Publishers in mid-June. Its subtitle, What Rare Genes Can Say about Early Human Migration,” highlights special ancient markers the company’s research has begun increasingly to reap results from–Rare Genes from History, autosomal haplotypes and private alleles. It appeared in paperback (45.00) and hardback editions (65.00), with more than 100 maps, charts and illustrations, many by Richard L. Thornton, architect and indigenous history specialist, along with a foreword by Jane Mellin. In January 2026, an audiobook version on Audible (19.00), narrated by Voice Actor Julie Little, joined the lineup. Owing to rampant book piracy and abuses of AI, no digital form was released. Initial reviews were quite favorable, many noting the unique direction Dr. Yates’s investigations have taken focusing on Austronesian genes and Sundaland perspectives first advanced by Oxford geneticist and author Stephen Oppenheimer.
Alluding to his two previous books on Cherokee DNA that carried subtitles claiming to “prove the geneticists wrong” and vindicate Cherokee descendants as right, In a postscript, Yates underlined “the growing credibility gap between professionals who practice or teach genetics and lay persons interested in genealogy who purchase DNA tests.” Instead of the usual academic amenities, he thanked “the customers of the company [whose] curiosity, insistence and interest that was my constant goad and guide,” adding, “I am grateful to them for bringing me their problems and questions, for entrusting us with their family stories, their doubts and their disappointments (p. 294).” The book is dedicated to Heide Goettner-Abendroth, “founder of modern matriarchal studies.”
Holly McDaniel, a member of the Echota Cherokee Tribe of Alabama with ancestry in both the Cherokees and Savannah River Band of Euchee Indians, is the perfect picture of Euchee and Austronesian. Her ancestor was believed to be a sister of Euchee/Creek chief Brim. See s.v. “Emperor Brim,” Encyclopedia of Alabama, online at https://encyclopedia ofalabama.org/article/emperor-brim/. Used with permission. © Holly McDaniel 2025. Not to be reproduced without permission. Right: Unidentified Maori woman of today. Notice the similarities in physique, facial structure and hair. (p. 198)
“One chapter, ‘Children of the Sun’ focuses on America’s neglected Euchee Indians, said to be its oldest indigenous group, now proved to be primarily Austronesian in origin and ethnicity… Another discusses the origin of the so-called Libyan script, the true culture of those who built Ohio Valley burial and effigy mounds and the meaning of artifacts called Adena.” –From the Foreword by Jane Mellin (p. viii)
2. Episode 15 of our podcast series, Time Traveler’s Suitcase, appeared toward the end of 2025. Titled “The Mother of All Wars: Patriarchy against Matriarchy,” it reprised the work of Teresa Panther-Yates, author and vice president, on goddess studies. Narrated by Elisha Daeva (Before War), the program follows the Mother Goddess’s presence through ancient cultures, sacred symbols, serpents, trees, visionary rites, Female wisdom and the long history of matriarchal traditions. It examines how the Female Divine was gradually overthrown and silenced in patriarchal texts, how Her images survived in fragments of poetry, folklore, temples and ancient literature, and how loss of the Goddess altered society, spirituality and our relationship with Nature–and how the absence of life-fulfilling spirituality continues to injure people, male, female or child, today.
Awa tribesman Karapiru as photographed for Survival International’s support project. His name means Hawk, the highest deity of Austronesian people from whom Amazonian Indians are now thought to descend. Donate or Shop at Survival International.
3. At the end of the year, we added 6 new South American Indian populations and introduced the latest version of our forensic database, atDNA 6.11. This database is based on public information, not proprietary data, and represents the heart of the success of the DNA Consultants™ fingerprint tests. These now include Basic American Indian, Cherokee DNA, Rare Genes from History and Basic Haplotype, the later introduced only last year.
Donald and Teresa Yates at their Euchee marriage ceremony at Floridatown, June 26, 1999.
4. Responding to a shift on the part of the consuming public away from patronizing mammoth corporations and instead favoring local and family outlets, DNA Consultants substituted the more down-to-earth and personal video “Our Story” on the home page of its website. Comments on the minute-and-a-half long video, itself homemade by Donald and Teresa Yates, have been gratifying. DNA Consultants has now been in business since 2003 and its offerings extend from forensic ancestry tests and population reference sources to a growing bookstore, podcast series and blog. In 2026, we hope to move to an improved user system and online report formats.
Bobbie Greene, M.A., M.Ed., Associate DNA Investigator, Forensic Genealogy Specialist and Populations Pages Manager. Email her at bg@d*n*a*c*o*n*s*u*l*t*a*n*t*s.com. (remove *) or leave a message at Contact Us.
5. At the behest of its customers, the company introduced a new genealogy product in mid-year, Vital Records Family Tree (1,000.00). This genealogy package will build out all known branches of your family tree, beginning with the 1950 U.S. Census and tracing back through the nineteenth century. The 1850 census is often critical, as it was the first to list each household member by name and age, offering a clear view of family structure. The 1950 U.S. census is the last to be released and made public. The 1960 U.S. census is scheduled to be unlocked in six years, April 1, 2032. Our lead forensic genealogy sppecialist, Bobbie Greene, welcomes inquiries on your genealogy and can structure payments to be monthly or bimonthly so the work is more affordable.
We wish all our customers and constituents a healthy, positive and productive New Year. Stay human and keep watching for new products, news, research findings and enjoy our Facebook page.
Best regards,
Don, Teresa, Angel, Angela, Jakay, Bobbie, Alex, Helena and Wendell
More Information
The Countercurrents of Prehistory (announcement, May 31, 2025)
Before He Dies Donald Yates Exposes the Cherokee DNA Mystery–America’s Darkest Secret Cracked, by Marilza Silva (25:43), Dec. 19, 2025
For generations, Cherokee identity has been grounded in land, language, shared memory, and survival, not in lab results or percentages on a screen. That belief began to fracture when DNA testing entered the story and returned answers no one expected. Genetic data revealed markers linked not only to the Americas, but to the Old World, creating questions that went far beyond science. This shift is closely tied to Donald Yates, a man of Cherokee ancestry who discovered Jewish roots in his own DNA and then helped lead the Cherokee DNA Project, unintentionally opening a modern crisis of identity. At the same time, the culture itself faces another threat: fewer than 150 fluent Cherokee speakers remain alive, fighting to bring their language back from the edge of extinction. If language is fading while DNA tells a more complex story, what truly defines belonging? Does unexpected ancestry weaken identity, or redefine it? And who gets to decide what “native” really means today?
Fight or Flight on the Amazon (blog post, Dec. 31, 2025)
Trajectories of Americans of Jewish Descent, including full text of the book Religious Fluidity in the 17th and 18th Century, by Douglas S. Schar (Feb. 4, 2025)
Gifts from the East: Some Comments on the Yue, Euchee, Austronesians and Sundaland (May 27, 2025)