Monday, December 8, 2008
New Field Of Research Could Help Police In Crime Scene Forensics
On September 1,2008 the Science Daily had an article titled New Field of Research Could Help Police In Crime Scene Forensics. The article reported on a breakthrough in DNA identification. Scientists from the Translational Genomics Research Institute, or TGen, have found a way to use high-density Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) genotyping microarrays to identify individual DNA from a sample of mixed DNA. Before, it was difficult for police to pick out specific DNA if it composed les than 10% of the sample. Now, they can pick out individual DNA from over 200 samples with this new technique, or if the specific DNA is less than .1%. As Dr. David W. Craig, the associate director of TGen’s Neurogenomics Division, explained, "By employing the powers of genomic technology, it is now possible to know with near certainty that a particular individual was at a particular location, even with only trace amounts of DNA and even if dozens or even hundreds of others were there, too.'' This will help police investigators to be more able to identify possible suspects at a crime scene.
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2 comments:
Three aspects of the review that were well presented were what was developed, what it does, and how it will affect forensic science. Two ways in whici it could have been better were to give examples of hypothetical cases in which this could be used and to go into more depth about how this process works. One aspect of the review that surprised me was that it is possible to pick out DNA from .1% of a sample.
This article was very interesting, clearly dealt with cutting-edge science, and was well explained. It could have been further explained how the scientists came to have such conclusive research, or who supported their efforts. Overall though, it was very informative, as I had no idea this was even possible.
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