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Portable, rapid DNA analysis tech developed
Mobile fingerprint-checking equipment is already controversial before it has even rolled out widely. An announcement today may presage the next such row, as developers say they will soon roll out a "compact" machine based on "a small, single chip" which will massively reduce the amount of time taken to check a DNA sample. The …
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Wednesday 22nd September 2010 23:57 GMT BristolBachelor
Human Genome Project
This could be very helpful to the Human Genome project, which still hasn't managed to map the whole DNA of a single person.
I mean obviously this unit checks _ALL_ of the DNA, doesn't it? Otherwise it's a bit like arresting someone for murder because their first name was "John", which is the known first name of the murderer, and not bothering to check any further...
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Thursday 23rd September 2010 09:28 GMT david wilson
@BristolBachelor
>>"I mean obviously this unit checks _ALL_ of the DNA, doesn't it?"
Either you know the answer to that and yet you're trying to suggest that a DNA fingerprinting method needs to check every single base to be usable, or you don't know the answer, in which case you might be best advised to learn how DNA fingerprinting works.
Of course, the ironic thing is that the best way to show how accurate or inaccurate expert estimates of probabilities really are would be to have the largest possible DNA database.
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Thursday 23rd September 2010 09:11 GMT John Smith 19
A similar tech has been pioneered with farm animals
It reduced test time from several days to c1.5 Hrs.
One of the key issues was the reduction of a large heating block to a small fast heat/fast cool cycle in a chip.
Weather they can reduce it to less (given the more complex process) is doubtful. DNA analysis fast enough to act as a door lock is likely to be a fantasy for a while.
However that would put DNA analysis at police station level in 1 shift, rather than *days* (if your *lucky*) to a specialist DNA lab.
Weather this is a good thing is another matter.
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Thursday 23rd September 2010 10:42 GMT Dr Patrick J R Harkin
Why?
The driving force behind the development of the technology isn't identification of people, but of pathogens. Remember Bones' medical tricorder (and Spock's science tricorder)? Wave them in the air and they can detect dangerous viruses and bacteria? That's what's being developed. Last I heard (3 or so years ago) they were back-pack sized, but three years is a long time in technology!
Microbiology has changed enormously since I was a medical student - I walked past a micro lab a few months back and I wouldn't have recognised it - not a bunsen burner or agar plate in sight, just rows of PCR machines. It's much faster than waiting for things to grow on plates.
However, once you've invented the kit, there's always the temptation to find another market.
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Thursday 23rd September 2010 11:04 GMT Robert Forsyth
It is just a sieve
DNA finger printing just chops the DNA at a certain combination of molecules using an enzyme, this give strands of various lengths. The chip just measures the proportion of each size. It does not decode the DNA. The resultant display gives a signature that is not unique: like error checking.
Lots of people must have the same PIN as it is only four digit and there are 50+ million people in the UK.
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Thursday 23rd September 2010 12:20 GMT Anonymous Coward
Police and DNA
10 years ago i worked for a company in Cambridge doing DNA on a chip (for personal medicine)
We talked to a lot of Police officers about DNA and they definitely had the impression that DNA from the scene would allow them to identify the suspect even if they didn't have a match.
They had been sold on the idea that from the DNA they would be able to know the suspect's height/weight/eye colour/race etc.
A few thought they had been scammed by the DNA labs - but more than half thought it was just a question of the technology getting better and eventually they would be able to do this.
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Thursday 23rd September 2010 14:33 GMT Ross 7
A couple of issues
1) Days to do PCR?!? lolz. It takes a few hours tops, and that's doing it all manually. Still, putting it all on a chip is pretty clever. However, how do they clean it between uses? And what happens when some numpty drops the ethidium bromide refill in the street and some kiddy thinks it looks tasty?
2) "At present this can normally only be done at a station, meaning that plods must arrest anyone unwilling to give their prints in order to conduct a check" (re: fingerprinting on the street)
Erm, they'd still need to arrest the person to take their prints if they refused to allow it voluntarily. I suggest you check out s.61 PACE 1984. However, s.61(2) makes for very interesting reading in light of a portable finger print checking thingummy. I foresee many claims of "oh yes m'Lud, he consented to giving his fingerprints... No, we didn;t get it in writing 'cause we were in the back of the van"
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