Forensics and the Agilent 2100 Bioanalyzer
 Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequencing is a powerful tool that is frequently used to characterize forensic samples when the samples are degraded or in small quantity. Mitochondria are present in all cells and often in large quantities therefore mtDNA from hair, teeth, bones or other skeletal remains can be amplified and compared with maternal samples where standard DNA STR techniques will not work.
Mitochondrial DNA analysis can be tedious and time consuming therefore having a method to rapidly assess sample quality prior to mtDNA sequencing is imperative. The Agilent 2100 Bioanalyzer and the DNA 1000 kit allow you to quickly check sample quality and concentration post PCR amplification to help ensure the best quality sequence reads.
Benefits of the Agilent 2100 Bioanalyzer in the mtDNA workflow
- Speed – analyze 12 samples in 30 minutes
- Reproducibility – user-independent digital data
- Rapidly determine sample quality and concentration
- Check for impurities or G-stretch stutters
- Ease of use – ready-to-use kits with validated chips and reagents
Application Notes from Agilent Technologies
Paper from the Federal Aviation Administration
In addition to mtDNA studies, more work has been done by the FAA detailing the benefits of using the Agilent 2100 Bioanalyzer vs. typical CE instrumentation for genotyping forensic specimens using a subset of CODIS 13 alleles.
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