Possible nightmare for the future re DNA tracing

[Churchie]

Fascinating.

I have a friend who was born with a chimera, in her eye. Honestly. It was removed as it started to affect her sight as a child.
Gives me the heeby jeebys thinking about it.

[DevonCruwys]

Not really DNA has never been able to prove paternity, there is always an element of doubt, it can however disprove paternity.

The old-style paternity tests use up to 15 autosomal STR markers. These do indeed leave some element of doubt. This type of test is still used by the courts.

However, a genetic genealogy autosomal DNA test, which look at 700,000 markers across the entire genome, is able to prove paternity and maternity without any element of doubt at all. Indeed there are now a number of examples of adoptees who have taken such a test and have actually been matched with one of their biological parents. With whole genome sequencing and advanced DNA analysis it is now even possible to distinguish between identical twins.

[DavidG02]

Are you saying DC that the old '' if you have an identical twin you can get away with murder'' is now no longer possible? Or were you referring to the IT parenting issue?

[DevonCruwys]

Are you saying DC that the old '' if you have an identical twin you can get away with murder'' is now no longer possible? Or were you referring to the IT parenting issue?

I am indeed saying that. Here's the scientific paper:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1872497313002275

The difficulty would be in extracting enough DNA at the crime scene in order to produce a whole genome sequence so that you could detect the rare discriminating variants. There is a forensic company that sells this test but I believe it's very expensive.

[Guy Etchells]

That is a very interesting and welcome development of DNA science.

I assume there are still many further steps to be taken to "prove" the results but it shows how quickly the science is developing.

Cheers
Guy

[DavidG02]

I am indeed saying that. Here's the scientific paper:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1872497313002275

Thank you As Guy commented its an interesting development

[pharmaT]

Not really DNA has never been able to prove paternity, there is always an element of doubt, it can however disprove paternity.

There have been many cases of DNA differences in samples taken from different areas of the body and many different reasons for the differences.

Cheers
Guy

There was a paternity case in the USA fairly recently where a woman had sex with identical twins within 24 hours. Wanting to prove the paternity of her child she arranged for tests to be taken.
The first result showed that there was a 1 in 10,000 chance this twin was not the father. Unfortunately, the test on the second twin gave the same result!!

Lol funny that.

On another note isn't the human body amazing.

[Guy Etchells]

Not really DNA has never been able to prove paternity, there is always an element of doubt, it can however disprove paternity.

There have been many cases of DNA differences in samples taken from different areas of the body and many different reasons for the differences.

Cheers
Guy

There was a paternity case in the USA fairly recently where a woman had sex with identical twins within 24 hours. Wanting to prove the paternity of her child she arranged for tests to be taken.
The first result showed that there was a 1 in 10,000 chance this twin was not the father. Unfortunately, the test on the second twin gave the same result!!

Lol funny that.

On another note isn't the human body amazing.

In 2002 a pregnant American woman was charged with fraud after DNA test showed she was not the mother of her children.
The DNA was taken due to her claim for maintenance payments for the support of her first two children from their father.
Hospital records of her prior births were disregarded, as she was pregnant with her 3rd child the judge ordered a witness to be present at the birth and be witness to blood samples taken from mother and the new infant. These samples showed the mother not to be the mother of her own baby.
It was later proved this was a case of chimerism, (two different sets of DNA present in a persons body).

Cheers
Guy

[DevonCruwys]

Chimerism is incredibly rare. There are only about 30 cases recorded worldwide:

http://abcnews.go.com/Primetime/shes-twin/story?id=2315693