Race identification for a biological profile of unknown individuals
No Thumbnail Available
Authors
Martinez, Shelli A.
Issue Date
2007
Type
Thesis
Language
en
Keywords
Forensic sciences
Alternative Title
Abstract
Since the early 1900's, race identification has been of interest. Many methods have been utilized, from analysis of skeletal bones with discriminant functions, blood groups, DNA fingerprinting, STRs including Y-STRs and SNPs. Buck and Vidarsdottir (2004) used geometric morphometric methodology to determine race in sub-adult skeletons and yielded 70% of racial matches and 88% when smaller racial group were analyzed. The experiment by Cerri et al. (2003), showed that it is possible to determine a rapist's full or partial Y-profiles in different DNA mixtures, when the genetic profile could not be detected by autosomal STRs. Dixon et al. (2005) showed that with certain samples, it is easier to obtain a profile using SNPs. Saliva stains, degraded for 147 days, generated an 81% complete SNP profile while STRs were only 18% complete; similarly for blood, degraded at 243 days, proauced full SNP profiles but only 9% with STRs.