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Category Archives: DNA
Day 15 of the La Mesa Murders trial: Strong’s DNA found in Luis Rios’ car – KYMA
Posted: March 17, 2017 at 6:48 am
Day 15 of La Mesa Street Murders Trial
YUMA, Ariz. - An expert in DNA forensic analysis told the jury she found Preston Strong's DNA on the steering wheel of Luis Rios' Dodge Durango, in day 15 of the La Mesa Street Murders trial.
According to Lorraine Heath, previously with the Arizona Department of Public Safety's (DPS) Crime Lab, DNA from at least four people was found on the Durango's steering wheel.
Rios' Dodge Durango went missing from the home shortly before police arrived on June 24, 2005, the night of the incident.
The prosecution alledges the suspect used the Durango as his getaway car.
On Tuesday, Heath told the jury that detectives collected and sent her six swabs with DNA evidence from the steering wheel.
"Now the police took swabs from various places in the Dodge Durango," prosecutor John Tate told the jury during opening statements on February 7, "These were sent to the DPS crime lab for DNA analysis by a scientist at the Department of Public Safety. Her name is Lorraine Heath and she created a profile from that DNA that was matched to a profile of Preston Strong."
On Tuesday, Heath confirmed Tate's explanation. However, she only considered three of the individuals to be "major contributors".
"When I look at the profile of more than one person, the information can tell if there is more DNA than another person. It is very dependent on the actual item, but we call those with more DNA "major contributors" or "significant contributors"," Heath told the jury.
Heath said Rios, Strong, and a third unidentified person were considered "major contributors".
"Luis Rios was definitely considered a significant contributor, as is expected for the owner of the vehicle," Heath explained.
Moreover, Strong's DNA was also greatly represented in the sampling.
"We also assign a weight to the decision so, in this case, we believe it is 9 million times more likely the three contributors' DNA belonged to Rios, Strong and an unknown person than if it was Rios and two unknown Hispanic individuals," Heath explained.
According to Heath, when she first tested and found the DNA, she didn't know it belonged to Strong.
"I initially didn't have Strong's DNA to reference it with. I wrote it down as a larger foreign contributor that wasn't Rios. Later when I got Strong's swab, I was able to match Strong to the steering wheel," Heath explained.
Heath said that she tested the DNA on August 25, 2005.
A sample of Strong's DNA was sent to her in late March of 2006. She created his profile on April 5, 2006 and identified him as the second "foreign contributor".
Heath said there was a fourth, or possibly more other minor contributors, whose DNA was found on the steering wheel.
"I wouldn't say the total number was eight, but it was at least four total contributors including minor contributors," Heath explained.
While Heath said she couldn't determine when the DNA was left by a person, she said the more of the person's DNA that is found, the higher they were the last to touch it, especially on something like a steering wheel.
"The steering wheel, for example, was handled a lot by the owner. Right after he touched it, his DNA would be there and if I were then to touch it, I will start rubbing off his DNA and adding mine," Heath explained, "Assuming the vehicle is in routine use by the owner, I would expect another significant contributor handled the vehicle fairly recently."
During cross examination, the defense questioned Heath about the DNA extraction process in 2005 and its evolution since then.
Heath answered that the process for extraction had remained the same, but new procedures in documentation had been implemented.
"I would say I am more likely to document more steps now, than I did then. We are encouraged to write more down," Heath said.
Heath added that per standard procedure, her findings were also peer reviewed by another colleague before being shared with detectives.
The defense also questioned Heath about the number of people whose DNA was tested in reference to the steering wheel.
Heath replied there were 18 total references.
Javier Frigo, Luis Leal Morisca, Raya Shaya, Kimberly Cole, Carlos Banda, Lester Cornelius, Michael McCormick, Arturo Romero and Susan Mejia were ruled out as being possible "significant contributors".
Diego Cisneros, Rebekah Rios, Danny Heredia, Inez Newman, Enrique Bedoya and Andreas Crawford, were ruled out as being "significant contributors" but were given inconclusive results in reference to them being possible "minor contributors".
"I can't say for sure that they aren't or that they are minor contributors, but they are excluded from being major contributors," Heath explained.
Defense Attorney Raymond Hanna further questioned Heath about other evidence items submitted for DNA testing.
Heath said she tested several other items and looked for matches with Strong's DNA but found none elsewhere.
"Strong's DNA was excluded from the 35 other items," Heath said.
A juror also asked about the DNA found on the other items.
"Many of the items collected matched the victims. There were few items with foreign DNA," Heath answered.
"Bindings are difficult to analyze from a DNA perspective. It is hard to get foreign DNA. Typically you just get the person that was bound. We figure one possibility for this is because there is so much friction from the person being bound, so the other DNA rubs off," Heath continued.
Heath said that the foreign DNA that was found on some of the items and bindings submitted could have come from any source, including detectives.
"It could be anything from the time the binding was removed to talking over things [evidence]," Heath explained," We don't like to think we are spitting when we're talking but we totally are."
Heath said trace levels of foreign DNA were found on 6-year-old Danny Heredia.
"But like I mentioned, they could come from anywhere," Heath said.
Yuma Police Department Lieutenant Wayne Boyd also took the stand on Tuesday.
Day 16 of the trial resumes on Monday, March 20.
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DNA Confirms Assassination Victim Was Half Brother of Kim Jong-un, Malaysia Says – New York Times
Posted: at 6:48 am
New York Times | DNA Confirms Assassination Victim Was Half Brother of Kim Jong-un, Malaysia Says New York Times The forensics wing of the Hospital Kuala Lumpur, where the body of Kim Jong-nam is being held. Malaysian officials said a DNA sample from one of his children had been used to confirm his identity. Credit Lillian Suwanrumpha/Agence France-Presse ... Kim Jong Nam's Identity Verified by Child's DNA: Malaysian Deputy PM Ahmad Zahid: Jong-nam's son gave DNA to identify body North Korea shock as TRUE identity of 'Kim's murdered brother' revealed by DNA |
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DNA Confirms Assassination Victim Was Half Brother of Kim Jong-un, Malaysia Says - New York Times
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Your DNA May Determine How You Handle the Time Change – Lincoln Journal Star
Posted: March 12, 2017 at 7:47 pm
SATURDAY, March 11, 2017 (HealthDay News) -- Some people have more trouble adjusting to daylight saving time than others and genes may be the reason why, says an expert on sleep/wake patterns.
The time change occurs 2 a.m. Sunday morning when clocks "spring ahead" one hour.
"It is likely that advancing our clocks in the spring would more affect owls, those individuals who tend to stay awake later at night and consequently wake up later in the morning," said Dr. Joseph Takahashi.
"Less affected are the larks, those individuals who tend to wake up early and go to sleep earlier," he added. Takahashi is chairman of neuroscience at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.
"Since being an owl or a lark is in large part genetically influenced, the best way to deal with daylight saving time is to be self-aware of your chronotype (early versus late awakening and sleeping) and to realize that advancing your clock will be harder if you are an owl and easier if you are a lark," he advised in a medical center news release.
To check your chronotype, you can take a simple online test called the Munich Chronotype, Takahashi suggested.
Because some studies have found a spike in traffic crashes after the time change, Takahashi said it's a good idea to "go to sleep slightly ahead of your normal bedtime." Then, in the morning, he added, "have an extra coffee and be vigilant on the road."
Research also indicates that more heart attacks occur after daylight saving time starts.
"It is now well established that the incidence of heart attacks is highest in the morning. Since waking up one hour earlier adds to stress and sleep deprivation, these might contribute to the increase," Takahashi said.
The U.S. National Institute of General Medical Sciences has more on circadian rhythms.
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Your DNA May Determine How You Handle the Time Change - Lincoln Journal Star
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Scientists Just Mastered an Error-Free Way to Store Data on DNA – Inc.com
Posted: at 7:47 pm
Ask any business what it takes to really get ahead and data analysis comes pretty close to topping the list. The stink in the commode, though, is that companies have so much data that just storing it--let alone putting it to use--is problematic. But if scientists have their way, in the not-so-distant future, you very well could use deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) as a storage medium. As Robert Service of Science reports, researchers say they've created a new method to encode digital data onto DNA that's more efficient and accurate than any other process used until now.
Service notes several reasons why scientists are eying DNA as a viable data storage choice:
Because of these benefits, researchers have been working with DNA for data storage since 2012. But none have been able to store more than half of what researchers believe actually is possible (1.8 bits of data per nucleotide of DNA).
Yaniv Erlich, computer scientist at Columbia University, partnered with Dina Zielinski , associate scientist at the New York Genome Center. To get data onto DNA and retrieve it in a more efficient, less error-prone way, they completed the following steps:
The results, announced earlier this week, were outstanding, encoding 1.6 bits of data per nucleotide (85 percent what scientists think is the maximum) and exceeding previous attempts by other scientists by 60 percent. There were no errors, and through polymerase chain reaction, a modern technique people already use to copy DNA, Erlich and Zielinski were able to replicate the files without issue.
The price tag for Erlich and Zielinski's process was $9,000. And that's just for six measly files. Imagine the cost for all the files we've ever created, or the cost of the files people will create just today alone. In short, we're not nearly to the point where the technique would be financially prudent for companies or individuals. And writing and reading to DNA is still painfully slow, according to Erlich. So even if you could afford to use it right now, it's an archiving tool at best until technology streamlines the coding and decoding process. But those advances will happen. And when companies already are using artificial intelligence, robots and bionics, the line between natural and large-scale artificial learning might be closer than we think.
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Scientists Just Mastered an Error-Free Way to Store Data on DNA - Inc.com
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Innovative technique greatly increases sensitivity of DNA sequencing – Science Daily
Posted: at 7:47 pm
Innovative technique greatly increases sensitivity of DNA sequencing Science Daily To sequence DNA, scientists often use a technique called polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to increase the amount of DNA available from a sample. However, PCR can introduce mistakes that can limit researchers' ability to detect real mutations in the ... |
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Innovative technique greatly increases sensitivity of DNA sequencing - Science Daily
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We Can Now Use DNA To Store Everything From A Movie To An … – Co.Exist
Posted: March 11, 2017 at 7:47 am
In the 1995 cyberpunk thriller Johnny Mnemonic, Keanu Reeves stars as a man whose childhood memories have been wiped so his brain can be used to smuggle data. It's all very mid-'90s dystopia, but it the premise, as it turns out, isn't too far-fetched: In a new study, scientists have demonstrated that it's possible to use DNA to store all kinds of data, including movies.
In Johnny Mnemonic, the smuggling was done with a chip implanted in the brain, which is pretty quaint compared to this new technique, which involves writing the information into the DNA itself. DNA is designed to carry data and replicate it without error, after all, so it would seem to be a perfect storage medium.
The researchers, from the New York Genome Center and the Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics at Columbia, wrote six different files into DNA: a computer operating system, a French movie, an image of the Pioneer plaque, a study by information theorist Claude Shannon, a computer virus, and an Amazon gift card.
To begin with, the researchers mapped pieces of computer informationthe ones and zeros that make up any digital fileonto DNA nucleotides. They then synthesized those organic molecules into DNA strands and stored the DNA in a test tube. To extract the information, they sequenced that DNA (the same way you'd sequence any DNA). What they got back was a perfect copy of the original data.
This is obviously an incredible discovery, and it has a definite purpose beyond making the plot of a sci-fi movie a little more plausible. DNA is designed for storage, and it turns out to be way better at it than anything we have invented ourselves.
"DNA has several big advantages," study co-author Yaniv Erlich told Research Gate. "First, it is much smaller than traditional media. In fact, we showed that we can reach a density of 215 petabytes per gram of DNA! Second, DNA lasts for an extended period of time, over 100 years, which is orders of magnitude more than traditional media." To put that in perspective, one petabyte is 1,000 terabytes: roughly 16,000 times the data that your 64GB iPhone can store. DNA can store 215 petabytes in just 0.035 ounces.
DNA has another big advantage over any other storage medium: It's future-proof. Do you have any old floppy disks laying around? Cassette tapes of music, or vinyl records? All of those are impossible to play unless you have the original machine to do it. These appliances may be available now, but who knows how easy it will be to find them in another few decades (or centuries)? DNA, on the other hand, "has been around for 3 billion years," Erlich said, "and humanity is unlikely to lose its ability to read these molecules."
Erlich and his research partner Dina Zielinski estimate that commercial DNA data storage won't be available for over a decade. When it is, though, the storage race may be overand, in the future, data smuggling inside your own body will be a very real and creepy possibility.
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We Can Now Use DNA To Store Everything From A Movie To An ... - Co.Exist
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California Bill Would Extend Taking DNA Samples To Some Misdemeanor Suspects – CBS Sacramento
Posted: at 7:47 am
March 10, 2017 11:06 PM By Lemor Abrams
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) Its been four decades since Shirley Derryberrys 13-year-old sister Doris was killed in cold blood.
But the cold case is now over, thanks to new DNA evidence linking two cousins to the crime.
I wanted to climb across the wall and choke em but that puts me in the same category theyre in, said Derryberry.
Derryberry says the killers responsible for her sisters vicious rape and murder would not be caught today, because of new laws.
Under current state law, cops can collect DNA only from felony suspects. But under Proposition 47, many violent crimes are reduced to misdemeanors, and there are far fewer DNA samples taken.
Here we are covering for a small percentage of the population, said Assemblyman Jim Cooper.
Assemblyman Jim Cooper says he has a common sense solution. The former Sacramento County Sheriffs deputy says his proposed law would allow cops to collect DNA for crimes downgraded to misdemeanors.
When those cold cases were solvedthose homicides, rapes, vicious murders.they were solved not from that case, they got solved because they got DNA from a theft crime, or drug crime, said Cooper.
Assembly bill 16, DNA collection, is a reintroduction of Assembly bill 390, from Coopers first term. The bill failed last year, because critics argue, its unfair. The California Attorneys for Criminal Justice says, not all crimes are equal.
The government cannot collect your DNA unless theres good reason. Good justification. If they have evidence absolutely we understand that, said Ignacio Hernandez, a lobbyist for the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice.
Cooper says stories like this is reason enough. Shirely Derryberrys sister never made it past middle school. And her parents died wondering who killed their little girl.
Shell always be in my heart, said Derryberry.
Shirley Derryberry will be testifying at the bills first committee hearing next Tuesday.
Twitter: @LemorAbrams Email: labrams@kovr.com Instagram: LemorAbrams Lemor Abrams is an Emmy-Award winning news reporter, who has interviewed thousands of people, from key political figures to everyday folks who impact their community. Her very...
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California Bill Would Extend Taking DNA Samples To Some Misdemeanor Suspects - CBS Sacramento
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What DNA Ancestry Testing Can (and Can’t) Tell You – YES! Magazine
Posted: at 7:47 am
As a descendant of enslaved Africans, Ive always wondered where on the massive continent does my family have its roots. As I aged, I became more uneasy with the phrase descendant of enslaved Africans. Where in Africa and from whom, specifically? Millions of people from several different regions were brought to this land.
More than 20 years ago, my mother and aunt started a process of finding these answers. My mother then was excited to tell me about a man named Cupid, a not-so-distant relative.
The Rev. Cupid Aleyus Whitfield was born in 1868 to Cato and Amanda Whitfield, former slaves of Gen. William Gilchrist of Gadsden County, Florida. When he was about 16 years old, Cupid began teaching at a primary school and became known as one of the leading colored teachers in Gadsden County. He married Rebecca Zellene Goodson in 1889, and they had either nine or 14 children, depending on the source consulted.
My mother and aunt learned their father, Charlie Whitfieldmy grandfatherwas one of Cupids grandsons. This is all that I know of my maternal grandfathers lineage. Of my maternal grandmothers, I know even less.
Of my paternal family, I knew only my fathers name, and even after I met him in the late 1980s, that was still all that I knew. I never met his mother, father, or his siblings, and did not know their names. He passed away in April 2006, and I didnt learn about his death until months later. But I still wanted to know more about him. And so I began my search.
Unlike my mother and aunts experience of uncovering information to fill in the many blanks in our family tree, I have the privilege of Google, ancestry websites, and DNA testing companies that emerged in the early 2000s. This new technology is revolutionary for folks like me, who want to know not only where they come from but also from whomgenealogical researchers, adoptees searching for family members, and folks tracing family trees, particularly African American families that had been displaced by slavery.
In her decade-long fieldwork to learn how the new technology impacts the way people self-identify, Alondra Nelson, Columbia University professor of sociology, says she found so much more. Her latest book, The Social Life of DNA: Race, Reparations, and Reconciliation After the Genome, explores the way in which DNA is being used as a tool for racial reconciliation.
I spoke with Nelson about what DNA science might offer social change.
Zenobia Jeffries: You open your book with the story of the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo, the human rights organization that helps find children who were stolen and illegally adopted after their mothers were killed during the Argentine Dirty War. You later tell how DNA was unsuccessfully used in a reparations case here in the United States. How can science help answer fundamental questions about social justice and equality?
Alondra Nelson: The Argentina story shows us that science can help. In that case youre talking about grandparents and grandchildren. When youre doing a match, that sort of genetic line is actually pretty close. When youre talking about the experience of people of African descent, theres a gap of hundreds of years; you have a bigger mystery and a technical hurdle because youre dealing with the history of the slave trade. In post-apartheid Africa, you have families who have not been able to do burial rites for members of their [families] who died in the apartheid struggle. I think to be able to identify the remains of a specific loved one, and to be able to commemorate, bury, and memorialize that person is really powerful. Science can help with that identification, but we need to have some complicated conversations. Science cant be our moral compass.
Jeffries: What implication does DNA testing have for understanding racial and ethnic identity?
Nelson: Its complicated. The tests are far from definitive. The companies use different databases and make different kinds of mathematical and statistical assumptions. Those formulas and algorithms are their trade secrets, so theyre under no obligation to share them with other countries. So, what we think about in an academic setting, when you think about something being scientifically valid, it means that you can replicate it, you can verify it; [if] someone else does the same experiment or uses the same genetic sample from you and puts it in their database, theyll get the same results. With these companies, we dont have any of those kind of gold standards of what we might consider academic research science.
That said, for communities like African Americans, they are in many cases left without any other way to think about that. Though we have some communities whove been able to use food and linguistic ties, like the Gullah/Geechee communities, who link to contemporary Sierra Leone through linguistic ties. But those cases are less common.
And so you have a large swath of people who want to know and who are willing to try different ways of knowing. It can help to the extent that, regardless of whether youre of African descent, youve seen the reality television showspeople get a test, and it gives them sometimes new information, sometimes surprising information, or sometimes it just confirms or underscores what they already thought they knew.
Jeffries: Some tests break down ones percentage of ethnicity. But does knowing that bring us closer or divide us further when you talk about the struggle toward racial justice?
Nelson: A test that says youre this percent of this or this percent of that is making not a historical or factual assumption; its making a statistical and probabilistic assumption. So, what does it mean if a test says youre either 100 percent or 30 percent Nigerian? That means theyve created some algorithm that they assume is 100 percent Nigerian. But what in the world would that be? The history of human history is one of intermixing, intermarriage, intermating.
I use the phrase genealogical aspirations because the questions that people have in agreeing to the testing experience sort of shape what it can mean for them. If its important for you to know what part Norwegian you are versus what part Russian, then youre going to be interested in how you slice those things up. But if youre more interested in whether youre more European or more bio-geographically mixed, then you have a different read of what the tests are.
For me, whats important is not so much that these types of tests give you the truth of who you are, your identity, but that they suggest how we have come to think about putting human beings in buckets. None of these categories means anything outside of culture and history.
Jeffries: You say DNA can be used as a tool in the struggle for racial justice. Is using it for genealogical research part of that struggle?
Nelson: Sure. For people of African descent who feel incomplete without having that information about their African ancestry, it becomes very empowering.
Whether were talking about genetics or identity, we know that social movements and social activism come out of a sense of empowerment and agency. And like-minded people who feel empowered and outraged about the way things are can change things. That empowerment comes to some through the use of these tests is part of what mobilizes them for social justice issues.
Jeffries: For the companies that own these databases, is there something to be said about the politics of privacy and the ethics of who keeps our DNA?
Nelson: Different companies do different things. Often the consent forms you sign when you do one of these tests look like the consent that you sign when youre uploading a new operating systemtheres a lot of small words and people dont really read it. We know, for example, that some companies keep all of your data, because when youre dealing with millions of genetic markers, the bigger your databases are, the more reliable statistically speaking your findings can be.
And now that some companies are interested, not only in genetic ancestry testing but also in pharmaceutical developments, this data becomes really important. Theyre using peoples genetic samples to try to do investigations and for the development of personalized medicine and protocols.
But then you have the new genetic genealogy 2.0 thats been happening: the ability for people to upload their markers online, to make them available to other geneticists.
On one website you can fill out as much as you can of your family tree and also upload your genetic genealogy results so that other people can see them or people can contact you. On the one hand, theres two different competing interests here: One is people wanting to know more about their genealogy and their genetic genealogy, which might cause them to reveal information to other people. But then theres also this real necessary interest in privacy and the desire for privacy.
Someone might think, Well, Im just using this to do my genealogy. But that same data could be used to reveal things about your medical profile or could be used potentially to implicate people in the criminal justice system.
The thing about DNA thats different from other kinds of data is that it can be useful in all of these different social and political sitesthe exact same data, the exact same samples, potentially. Thats where the portability and transitive nature of DNA technology is the concern.
Im not trying to paint a dystopic future, but I think its something to worry about. Genetic data carries a lot of information that can be used simultaneously in a lot of different places for purposes for which people intend it to be used, and purposes that they do not.
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What DNA Ancestry Testing Can (and Can't) Tell You - YES! Magazine
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Police use DNA from burglar’s mask to solve years-old case – fox2now.com
Posted: at 7:47 am
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Authorities identified 26-year-old Javon Winston as their main suspect in a home burglary off Glades Avenue in Richmond Heights back in August 2014.
Court documents stated the homeowner came home to find all the rooms rummaged through and evidence of forced entry. While police were on the scene, Winston was seen running from the house, leaving behind a surgical mask that he was wearing.
Which our responders identified as a possible source of DNA and it was entered into the system and eventually we did get the suspect identified," said Captain Craig Mueller, Richmond Heights Police Department.
"It could be saliva, hair, or skin, anything that they leave behind. Maybe if they even breathe into a mask and left a skin particle somewhere and we take it over to the lab, they do a fantastic job of getting those processed for us."
Mueller said even though it may have taken a while before authorities identified Winston, there is a reason for it.
"Not everyone's DNA is in the DNA system, so we may get evidence at a crime scene and think we have DNA on it, however that suspects DNA might not be in the system, he said. It might be a year later before his or her DNA gets in the system and we make a match."
Mueller said it used to be that fingerprints were the way to go, but more and more officers are being trained in how to utilize advanced DNA technology.
"It's a much smaller database, he said. But as people start getting DNA and putting it in the system, it's getting more and more effective for us to fight crime. All Richmond Heights patrol officers, whether they are detectives or just the guy on the street, gets initial DNA skills.
Mueller added that, to a certain degree, there is the notion of what some citizens may see happening in TV crime dramas and compare it to real life crime solving.
"I think some people watch CSI TV shows and they think, You can just put somebody in andboomyou get an identification, he said. The wheels of justice go a little slowly, so just because we might not solve a crime that day, or somebody might not be in custody that week, it doesn't mean that we have forgotten about the case. So sometimes we get a little bit lucky or sometimes it's hard work from our detectives.
Mueller said the goal for law enforcement agencies is to try and eliminate the one year delay, meaning continuing to train officers in how to use the DNA database as it becomes bigger.
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Police use DNA from burglar's mask to solve years-old case - fox2now.com
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Helix Picks Eleven to Help Introduce Consumers to the Future of DNA Sequencing – Adweek
Posted: at 7:47 am
The future is in your genes.
Bay Area startup Helix believes that individual DNA genomes hold the key to mastering the digital economy, and many investors agree. The company, which launched last fall as a spinoff of genetic research giant Illumina on the strength of $100 million in private funding, wants to help all sorts of companies sell their products by using genetics as the ultimate targeting tool.
Now, Helix has chosen Eleven as its agency of record to help bring that message to the public after a review that included 10 agencies in the RFP phaseand three in the final round. The independent San Francisco shop will lead all branding and national advertising efforts for the company moving forward.
We truly believe that the next great discovery is youthe personal genetic story you have within. And we want to empower every person to tap into this knowledge and improve his or her life through DNA, said Helix CEO Robin Thurston in a statement. Thats why were building a platform for responsible DNA products, furthering the understanding of DNA for peoples everyday lives.
Helix has developed two products: One is a service that can map your personal DNA genomeand its billions of individual pointsin a matter of weeks, and the other is a platform that uses that profile to help consumers manage different aspects of their lives, allowing brands to create and market products tailored to a persons very specific needs.
Think of it as an app store driven by the genetic markers that make you unique among the planets 7.4 billion people.
Regarding his agencys newest client, Eleven CEO CourtneyBuechert said, The Helix protocol is to map my entire genome so I only have to be tested once. After sequencing for this data set, they will become a marketplace for specific providers.
Examples of such providers range from weight loss companies targeting individuals based on their genetic predispositions to a business that uses genes to recommend wines. The latter company already exists, and Buechert predicts that the biotech boom led by companies like Helix, 23andMe and Ancestry.com will soon be equal to or greater than consumer tech. One key difference between Helix and the latter businesses is that it doesnt simply test for genealogy; its technology can theoretically measure ones propensity for inherited illnessesor help athletes better learn how to maximize their performance potential.
Elevens first work for the brand, which should debut later this year, will be aimed at general market consumers rather than business-to-business audiences. The nature and scope of the work has not yet been determined, though Buechert said that content will be key and that Elevens ability to provide both creative and analytical services played a key role in the win.
Eleven has experience launching brands that build lasting and meaningful relationships with customers, and that aligns with our values at Helix, said Thurston in explaining his companys choice. They have a track record of bringing warmth and humanity to technology and brand thinking that goes beyond advertising, and can help guide how we think and talk about ourselves internally and with partners. We look forward to working with them on our story.
Elevens current roster includes Oakley, Dignity Health, Visa and its oldest client, Apple.
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Helix Picks Eleven to Help Introduce Consumers to the Future of DNA Sequencing - Adweek
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