This manual presents practical approaches to using DNA fingerprinting and genetic profiling to answer a variety of biological and medical questions. It provides detailed methodology for setting up and performing experiments and evaluating results. Extensive troubleshooting tips, helpful hints, and advice for daily practice are also included. This will be a useful guide for scientists and researchers engaged in genetic identification and relationship analyses.

Matching DNA samples from crime scenes and suspects is rapidly becoming a key source of evidence for use in our justice system. DNA Technology in Forensic Science offers recommendations for resolving crucial questions that are emerging as DNA typing becomes more widespread. The volume addresses key issues: Quality and reliability in DNA typing, including the introduction of new technologies, problems of standardization, and approaches to certification. DNA typing in the courtroom, including issues of population genetics, levels of understanding among judges and juries, and admissibility. Societal issues, such as privacy of DNA data, storage of samples and data, and the rights of defendants to quality testing technology. Combining this original volume with the new update-The Evaluation of Forensic DNA Evidence-provides the complete, up-to-date picture of this highly important and visible topic. This volume offers important guidance to anyone working with this emerging law enforcement tool: policymakers, specialists in criminal law, forensic scientists, geneticists, researchers, faculty, and students.

DNA profiling—commonly known as DNA fingerprinting—is often heralded as unassailable criminal evidence, a veritable “truth machine” that can overturn convictions based on eyewitness testimony, confessions, and other forms of forensic evidence. But DNA evidence is far from infallible. Truth Machine traces the controversial history of DNA fingerprinting by looking at court cases in the United States and United Kingdom beginning in the mid-1980s, when the practice was invented, and continuing until the present. Ultimately, Truth Machine presents compelling evidence of the obstacles and opportunities at the intersection of science, technology, sociology, and law.

In 1992 the National Research Council issued DNA Technology in Forensic Science, a book that documented the state of the art in this emerging field. Recently, this volume was brought to worldwide attention in the murder trial of celebrity O. J. Simpson. The Evaluation of Forensic DNA Evidence reports on developments in population genetics and statistics since the original volume was published. The committee comments on statements in the original book that proved controversial or that have been misapplied in the courts. This volume offers recommendations for handling DNA samples, performing calculations, and other aspects of using DNA as a forensic toolâ€"modifying some recommendations presented in the 1992 volume. The update addresses two major areas: Determination of DNA profiles. The committee considers how laboratory errors (particularly false matches) can arise, how errors might be reduced, and how to take into account the fact that the error rate can never be reduced to zero. Interpretation of a finding that the DNA profile of a suspect or victim matches the evidence DNA. The committee addresses controversies in population genetics, exploring the problems that arise from the mixture of groups and subgroups in the American population and how this substructure can be accounted for in calculating frequencies. This volume examines statistical issues in interpreting frequencies as probabilities, including adjustments when a suspect is found through a database search. The committee includes a detailed discussion of what its recommendations would mean in the courtroom, with numerous case citations. By resolving several remaining issues in the evaluation of this increasingly important area of forensic evidence, this technical update will be important to forensic scientists and population geneticistsâ€"and helpful to attorneys, judges, and others who need to understand DNA and the law. Anyone working in laboratories and in the courts or anyone studying this issue should own this book.

This state-of-the-art collection of easily reproducible methods includes all of the major techniques of DNA analysis currently used in forensic identity testing. The methods include the recovery of DNA from a large range of sample types, analysis of DNA as single and multi-locus VNTR probes, PCR amplification of STR and other loci, and mitochondrial sequencing. The expert scientists writing here -- many from laboratories around the world -- also discuss how to interpret the results in cases of unknown identity and disputed parentage.-- Covers all steps from extraction of human DNA through to analysis and interpretation-- Takes advantage of new methodologies such as capillary electrophoresis-- Clear step-by-step instructions ensure unfailing reproducibility.

DNA fingerprinting is a revolutionary technique that enables law enforcement agencies, diagnostic laboratories and research scientists to identify minute pieces of tissue, to determine parentage and other biological family relationships. This is a study of its applications.

Fundamentals of Forensic DNA Typing is written with a broad viewpoint. It examines the methods of current forensic DNA typing, focusing on short tandem repeats (STRs). It encompasses current forensic DNA analysis methods, as well as biology, technology and genetic interpretation. This book reviews the methods of forensic DNA testing used in the first two decades since early 1980's, and it offers perspectives on future trends in this field, including new genetic markers and new technologies. Furthermore, it explains the process of DNA testing from collection of samples through DNA extraction, DNA quantitation, DNA amplification, and statistical interpretation. The book also discusses DNA databases, which play an important role in law enforcement investigations. In addition, there is a discussion about ethical concerns in retaining DNA profiles and the issues involved when people use a database to search for close relatives. Students of forensic DNA analysis, forensic scientists, and members of the law enforcement and legal professions who want to know more about STR typing will find this book invaluable. - Includes a glossary with over 400 terms for quick reference of unfamiliar terms as well as an acronym guide to decipher the DNA dialect - Continues in the style of Forensic DNA Typing, 2e, with high-profile cases addressed in D.N.A.Boxes-- "Data, Notes & Applications" sections throughout - Ancillaries include: instructor manual Web site, with tailored set of 1000+ PowerPoint slides (including figures), links to online training websites and a test bank with key

Forensic DNA Applications: An Interdisciplinary Perspective was developed as an outgrowth of a conference held by the International Society of Applied Biological Sciences. The topic was human genome–based applications in forensic science, anthropology, and individualized medicine. Assembling the contributions of contributors from numerous regions around the world, this volume is designed as both a textbook for forensic molecular biology students and a reference for practitioners and those in the legal system. The book begins with the history and development of DNA typing and profiling for criminal and civil purposes. It discusses the statistical interpretation of results with case examples, mitochondrial DNA testing, Y single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and short tandem repeats (STRs), and X SNP and STR testing. It also explores low copy number DNA typing, mixtures, and quality assurance and control. The second section examines the collection and preservation of biological evidence under a variety of different circumstances and the identification of human remains—including in mass disaster settings. It discusses applications to bioterrorism investigations, animal DNA testing in criminal cases, pedigree questions and wildlife forensic problems, applications in forensic entomology, and forensic botany. The third section explores recent developments and new technologies, including the rigorous identification of tissue of origin, mtDNA profiling using immobilized probe strips, chips and next-generation sequencing, the use of SNPs to ascertain phenotypic characteristics, and the "molecular autopsy" that looks at aspects of toxicogenetics and pharmacogenetics. The book concludes with a discussion on law, ethics, and policy. It examines the use of DNA evidence in the criminal justice system in both the United States and Europe, ethical issues in forensic laboratory practices, familial searches, DNA databases, ancestry searches, physical phenotyping, and report writing. The contributors also examine DNA applications in immigration and human trafficking cases and international perspectives on DNA databases.

Given the explosive development of new molecular marker techniques over the last decade, newcomers and experts alike in the field of DNA fingerprinting will find an easy-to-follow guide to the multitude of techniques available in DNA Fingerprinting in Plants: Principles, Methods, and Applications, Second Edition. Along with step-by-step annotated p

Although DNA fingerprinting is a very young branch of molecular genetics, being barely six years old, its recent impact on science, law and politics has been dramatic. The application of DNA finger printing to forensic and legal medicine has guaranteed a high public profile for this technology, and indeed, scarcely a week goes by with out the press reporting yet another crime successfully solved by molec ular genetics. Less spectacularly, but equally importantly, DNA typing methods are steadily diffusing into an ever wider set of applications and research fields, ranging from medicine through to conservation biology. To date, two DNA fingerprinting workshops have been held in the UK, one in 1988 organised by Terry Burke at the University of Leicester, and the second in 1989 at the University of Nottingham, co-ordinated by David Parkin. In parallel with these workshops, which have provided an important focus for researchers, Bill Amos and Josephine Pemberton in Cambridge have established an informal newsletter "Fingerprint News" which is playing a major role as a forum for DNA fingerprinters. By 1989, it was clear that the field had broadened sufficiently to warrant a full international meeting. As a result, Gaudenz Dolf took on the task of organising the first, of what I hope will be many, International Symposium of DNA Fingerprinting held at Bern during Ist-3rd October 1990. The success of the meeting can be judged from the remarkable attendance, with 270 delegates from no less than 30 countries.