Chimaera
Fascinating! It is possible for one person to have two distinct sets of DNA. It is called Chimaerism (after a Greek myth) and it is caused when two fertilized eggs bond in the womb to form one. Usually a chimaera (person with two sets of genetic information) will exhibit physical abnormalities (like hermaphrodism or dual skin pigmentation). However, there are people out there who do not exhibit any abnormality and yet are chimaeras.
I saw a program on this a couple of nights ago on TLC. One woman in Boston needed a kidney transplant and was told after they tested her sons (potential donors), that they could not possibly be her biological children. Their DNA simply did not match hers in any way. It turns out that an individual can have one dominating genetic signature found in their blood, hair, skin, etc. and yet pass a completely different signature on to their children. This finding has dramatic implications regarding forensic science and the assumed infallibility of scientific "proof" in our legal system.
I saw a program on this a couple of nights ago on TLC. One woman in Boston needed a kidney transplant and was told after they tested her sons (potential donors), that they could not possibly be her biological children. Their DNA simply did not match hers in any way. It turns out that an individual can have one dominating genetic signature found in their blood, hair, skin, etc. and yet pass a completely different signature on to their children. This finding has dramatic implications regarding forensic science and the assumed infallibility of scientific "proof" in our legal system.
posted by Roxie at Thursday, October 06, 2005
1 Comments:
yes interesting indeed, I saw the word "legal system" and I honed in on your comments Rox, I wonder what implications this will have on the "beyond reasonable doubt test" for criminal liability, is the proportion of people that could be affected significant-mmm I may go and research this further insted of continueing with my essay on accounting for intangibles.
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