Gel Electrophoresis Case Study

The team of forensic anthropologists ran a gel electrophoresis with DNA from Skeleton 3 and two missing persons, Julia Ly and Teresa Chen to help in DNA identification. This process would allow restriction enzymes to cut by a specific restriction site and run through the gel, where the DNA fragments would move from the negative side to the positive side of the gel due to the negative charge of the phosphate group in DNA. The smaller the DNA fragments, the further they move down the gel. As mentioned above, the DNA that was collected, from skeleton 3 and two missing persons, was digested by Enzyme 1 (EcoRI) and 2 (HindIII). After analyzing the results of the gel electrophoresis, the team was able to identify the skeleton. As shown below, there
She was a 30-year-old Asian female who was 4’7” to 5’0” tall. According to the physical observations from the remains such as pelvis, femur, humerus, and skull, it was determined that the skeleton was a female with an Asian ethnicity around the age of 30. Furthermore, it was determined that she was 4’7” to 5’0” tall through looking at the remains. By then, the skeleton was either belonged to Julia Ly or Teresa Chen. Through performing the gel electrophoresis using two different restriction enzymes, EcoRI and HindIII, the results showed that both Skeleton 3 and Teresa Chen had two DNA fragments with one larger than the other while being digested by Enzyme 2, HindII. In addition, they had the same number of RFLPs in each DNA fragments, which showed that the missing person was Teresa