DNA TODAY
THE SCIENCE OF DNA HAS ALREADY CHANGED THE WORLD WE LIVE IN
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ARCHAEOLOGY
REBUILDING HISTORY
Skeletal remains can contain traces of ancient DNA for thousands of years.
Extracting and sequencing this genetic material can reveal not only the sex of the individual – whether they had aY chromosome or not – but also their ethnicity. This can help to retrace the steps taken by our ancestors as they spread across the world.
FORENSICS
SOLVING CRIMES
Forensic scientists identify DNA by examining sequences called ‘short tandem repeats’. These sequences occur in the gaps between genes and contain three or four DNA letters, repeated a different number of times in different people. Scientists count the number of repeats and compare them to repeats in a suspect’s DNA.