DNA Fingerprinting

Introduction In the United States a suspect in a crime is innocent until they are proven in court of law to be guilty beyond doubt(Cornell web), for now at least. This need to prove guilt in a suspect means the use of DNA to determine if the suspect was at least present at the crime scene is a powerful tool because no one person can change their DNA at will. The use of DNA as way to identify people has it 's origins in the United Kingdom because of a technique created by Dr. Alex Jeffreys used to relate DNA to each other and to DNA found at a scene(Herrera 74). This process is called DNA fingerprinting(Herrera 74) and is used in criminal forensics to help prove both guilt and innocence in suspects. It works both to ways because the results are very specific to DNA and will not give provide the same DNA in two people unless they are genetic twins. This expierment is used to show how this process is used in a criminal scenario but being able to discern parts of DNA can have other applications like seeing how closely related two people might be(Herrera 74).
Objective
The objectives for this lab is to extract DNA from …show more content…
The extraction of DNA from a source would be the first step in using it to prove someone 's guilt or innocence. Cheek cells are the source of DNA for this lab, they are obtained by swishing around a 1/4th oz of water in the mouth and then spitting out this water into a cup. A 1/4th oz of solution that contains a mix of detergent and NaCl is added to the cup of spit and mixed around. An ethanol solution is added to the cup and the amount added should be equal to the volume of the sample mixture, however once the DNA started to precipitate in the solution I stopped adding the ethanol. The DNA should be visible as a transparent white floating mass within the solution and it can be observed, removed, touched and