Beware the gene genies

"Where do I come from?" It's a question that many people have asked themselves at one time or another. You might think that the answer would be pretty straightforward. In my case, for example, it's there in black and white on my birth certificate: Watford. But people seem to want more than this. And plenty of people have been ready to cater for this need: preachers, philosophers, or archaeologists. Now it is geneticists who are making the running, and new businesses are springing up both in Britain and America dedicated to providing the answer - in exchange for a few cheek cells of DNA and a fat fee.