title: Improving the sensitivity of negative controls in ancient DNA extractions.
abstract: Much attention has been paid on ancient DNA (aDNA) studies, and negative control was used as one of the stringent quality assurance criteria in order to detect potential contamination. However, the results of some aDNA studies showed the evidence of contamination despite their negative controls failed to do so. Using lambda DNA to mock extraneous contaminating DNA, our study showed that aDNA had a property of improving the efficiency of extraction including contaminating DNA, while negative controls had low sensitivity to detect contamination. To circumvent this problem, carrier DNA such as poly(dA) is suggested to be introduced into aDNA extraction.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Genetic Engineering and MOE Key Laboratory of Contemporary Anthropology, School of Life Sciences and Institutes of Biomedical Sciences, Fudan University, Shanghai, PR China.
authors.forename: Zhi
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Fan
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Bosong
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Jingze
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tan
authors.forename: Shilin
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Li
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Jin
mesh_terms: D001106:Archaeology; D010582:Bacteriophage lambda / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics; D001842:Bone and Bones / Q000737:chemistry; D004247:DNA / Q000737:chemistry / Q000302:isolation & purification; D004279:DNA, Viral / Q000737:chemistry; D004340:Drug Contamination; D006801:Humans; D011061:Poly A / Q000737:chemistry*; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA / Q000379:methods*; D014070:Tooth / Q000737:chemistry
chemical_list: D004279:DNA, Viral; D011061:Poly A; C015465:poly(dA); D004247:DNA