A better DNA testing system to improve crime detection
The British Police Forensic Science Service (FSS) is working in a computer-assisted system aimed to analyze DNA samples that current methods are not capable to handle. If successful, this technique could improve the rates of crime detection by more than 15%.
One of the drawbacks of the otherwise powerful and seemingly infallible DNA profiling resides in its extreme sensitivity. A person’s DNA sample can very easily be contaminated with another person’s DNA at the contact of a finger. So far, forensic science allows police to obtain a DNA profile from a sample as long as it is not mixed with other person’s DNA, and it is not degraded (DNA breaks down as time passes). Because of these limitations, many cases usually go to a dead end.
The new approach investigated by British Police attempts to overcome these problems. It will be possible to “separate†the profiles from mixed DNA samples, and the technique is also better than the standard methods in handling partially degraded DNA.
This technique, named “DNAboost†is expected to improve significantly the rate of crime detection from now on, but also will allow police to go back to thousands of “cold†cases that went unresolved in the past, since in most cases all the evidence was kept. It will now be possible to re-analyze the data and at least some of these cases will be finally resolved.
