[Automated fluorescent analysis of STR profiling and sex determination]

Denaturing PAGE coupled with the ABI377 fluorescent automated DNA sequencer was used to test the performance and reproducibility of the automated DNA profiling systems at vWA31A, TH01, F13A01, FES, TPOX, CSF1PO and Amelogenin gene. The allele designation windows at the 7 genetic markers were established and implemented into the genotype reading software. Alleles differing in just 1 bp in length could easily be discriminated. Furthermore, the interpretation guidelines were outlined for the 7 genetic systems by investigating the relative peak areas of heterozygote peaks and relative stutter peak areas in various monoplex systems. Our results indicate that if the ratio between two peaks is equal to or higher than 0.404, a herozygote could be determined, otherwise the homozygote be made.