  We determine the strong-isospin violating component of the neutron-proton
mass difference from fully-dynamical lattice QCD and partially-quenched QCD
calculations of the nucleon mass, constrained by partially-quenched chiral
perturbation theory at one-loop level. The lattice calculations were performed
with domain-wall valence quarks on MILC lattices with rooted staggered
sea-quarks at a lattice spacing of b=0.125 fm, lattice spatial size of L=2.5 fm
and pion masses ranging from m_pi ~ 290 MeV to ~ 350 MeV. At the physical value
of the pion mass, we predict M_n - M_p |(d-u) = 2.26 +- 0.57 +- 0.42 +- 0.10
MeV where the first error is statistical, the second error is due to the
uncertainty in the ratio of light-quark masses, eta=m_u/m_d, determined by
MILC, and the third error is an estimate of the systematic due to chiral
extrapolation.
