title: One person with two DNA profiles: a(nother) case of mosaicism or chimerism.
abstract: Nuclear DNA markers, such as short tandem repeats (STR), are widely used for crime investigation and paternity testing. STR were used to determine whether a piece of tissue regurgitated by a dog was part of the penis of a dead, emasculated, man. Unexpectedly, when analyzing the recovered material and a blood sample from the deceased, five out of the 18 loci differed. According to the results, one could have concluded that these samples originated from two different persons. However, taking into account contextual information and data from complementary genetic analyses, the most likely hypothesis was that the deceased was a genetic mosaic or a chimera. Within a forensic genetic context, such genetic peculiarities may prevent associating the perpetrator of an offense with a stain left at a crime scene or lead to false paternity exclusions. Fast recognition of mosaics or chimeras, adapted sampling scheme, as well as careful interpretation of the data should allow avoiding such pitfalls.
authors.affiliation: Unité de Génétique Forensique, Centre Universitaire Romand de Médecine Légale, rue du Bugnon 21, 1011, Lausanne, Switzerland. Vincent.Castella@chuv.ch
authors.forename: Vincent
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Castella
authors.forename: Maria del Mar
authors.initials: Mdel M
authors.lastname: Lesta
authors.forename: Patrice
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Mangin
mesh_terms: D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000818:Animals; D046528:Chimerism; D004247:DNA / Q000235:genetics; D016172:DNA Fingerprinting; D004285:Dogs; D053803:Forensic Genetics; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009030:Mosaicism; D010413:Penis / Q000293:injuries / Q000473:pathology; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D020080:Tandem Repeat Sequences
chemical_list: D004247:DNA