Determining family connections of individuals in a database

1. A method of presenting, to a user of a personal genomic services platform, information related to relative connections between a first focal individual and a second focal individual who do not share a common ancestor within a threshold number of generations, the method comprising:

forming, using one or more computer processors, a relative connections graph comprising a plurality of nodes and a plurality of direct connections, each node representing a unique individual and each direct connection connecting exactly two nodes, the plurality of nodes including a node representing the first focal individual, a node representing the second focal individual, and a node representing each of a plurality of other individuals, wherein two nodes of the plurality of nodes are directly connected if two unique individuals represented by the two nodes share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations, and wherein two directly connected nodes indicate a genetic connection between the two unique individuals such that each direct connection in the relative connections graph indicates that, as far as the personal genomic services platform is aware, the two unique individuals share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations and the absence of a direct connection between the nodes representing two unique individuals in the relative connections graph indicates that, as far as the personal genomic services platform is aware, the two unique individuals do not share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations; and

displaying, to the user, information pertaining to the relative connections graph, wherein the information displayed to the user comprises information related to the relative connections of the first focal individual and the second focal individual who do not share a common ancestor within a threshold number of generations.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising obtaining from a database genotype data of the first focal individual, the second focal individual, and a plurality of other users of the personal genomic services platform, wherein the relative connections graph is formed at least in part based on the genotype data obtained from the database.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein at least two individuals in the relative connections graph are determined to be genetic relatives who share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations based on one or more Identical by Descent (IBD) regions shared between the two individuals.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising obtaining from a database of relative relationships reported by users of the personal genomic services platform, wherein the relative connections graph is formed at least in part based on the relative relationships reported by users.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein each direct connection between two individuals is assigned a weight based on the number of generations between the common ancestor and each of the two individuals.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the user is the first focal individual.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the threshold number of generations is four generations or five generations.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein displaying information pertaining to the relative connections graph includes displaying one or more of age information, surname information, residence information, or ancestry information associated with at least one of the plurality of other individuals.

9. The method of claim 1 , further comprising determining one or more genetic connections paths from the relative connections graph, wherein each of the one or more genetic connections paths connects the node representing the first focal individual to the node representing the second focal individual through at least one node representing at least one other individual.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein displaying information pertaining to the relative connections graph comprises displaying one or more genetic connections paths.

11. The method of claim 9 , further comprising determining the shortest genetic connections path of a plurality of genetic connections paths.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the shortest genetic connections path is determined to be a path of the plurality of genetic connections paths that has a fewest number of genetic connections.

13. The method of claim 11 , wherein each direct connection between two individuals is assigned a weight based on the number of generations between the common ancestor and each of the two individuals and wherein the shortest genetic connections path is determined using the weights associated with each connection between two directly connected nodes.

14. The method of claim 11 , wherein determining the shortest genetic connections path comprises performing a breadth-first search.

15. The method of claim 11 , wherein determining the shortest genetic connections path comprises performing a search based at least in part on Dijkstra's Algorithm.

16. The method of claim 1 , further comprising receiving, from the user via a user interface, identification information of the second focal individual.

17. The method of claim 16 , further comprising receiving, from the user via the user interface, identification information of the first focal individual.

18. The method of claim 16 , wherein the user is the first focal individual.

19. The method of claim 16 , wherein the identification information of the second focal individual is received prior to forming the relative connections graph.

20. A system for presenting, to a user of a personal genomic services platform, information related to relative connections between a first focal individual and a second focal individual who do not share a common ancestor within a threshold number of generations, the system comprising:

one or more processors configured to:

form a relative connections graph comprising a plurality of nodes and a plurality of direct connections, each node representing a unique individual and each direct connection connecting exactly two nodes, the plurality of nodes including a node representing the first focal individual, a node representing the second focal individual, and a node representing each of a plurality of other individuals, wherein two nodes of the plurality of nodes are directly connected if two unique individuals represented by the two nodes share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations, and wherein two directly connected nodes indicate a genetic connection between the two unique individuals such that each direct connection in the relative connections graph indicates that, as far as the personal genomic services platform is aware, the two unique individuals share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations and the absence of a direct connection between the nodes representing two unique individuals in the relative connections graph indicates that, as far as the personal genomic services platform is aware, the two unique individuals do not share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations, and display, to the user, information pertaining to the relative connections graph, wherein the information to display to the user comprises information related to the relative connections of the first focal individual and the second focal individual who do not share a common ancestor within a threshold number of generations; and

one or more memories coupled to the one or more processors, configured to provide the one or more processors with instructions.

21. A computer program product for presenting, to a user of a personal genomic services platform, information related to relative connections between a first focal individual and a second focal individual who do not share a common ancestor within a threshold number of generations, the computer program product being embodied in a tangible computer readable storage medium and comprising computer instructions for:

forming a relative connections graph comprising a plurality of nodes and a plurality of direct connections, each node representing a unique individual and each direct connection connecting exactly two nodes, the plurality of nodes including a node representing the first focal individual, a node representing the second focal individual, and a node representing each of a plurality of other individuals, wherein two nodes of the plurality of nodes are directly connected if two unique individuals represented by the two nodes share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations, and wherein two directly connected nodes indicate a genetic connection between the two unique individuals such that each direct connection in the relative connections graph indicates that, as far as the personal genomic services platform is aware, the two unique individuals share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations and the absence of a direct connection between the nodes representing two unique individuals in the relative connections graph indicates that, as far as the personal genomic services platform is aware, the two unique individuals do not share a common ancestor within the threshold number of generations; and

displaying, to the user, information pertaining to the relative connections graph, wherein the information displayed to the user comprises information related to the relative connections of first focal individual and the second focal individual who do not share a common ancestor within a threshold number of generations.