Category Archives: DNA

DNA in relation to torture case delayed until August

Posted: Published on April 25th, 2014

Topics: court, crime, mackay, robbery, torture DNA statements linked to an alleged torture, assault and robbery of a 40-year-old woman in South Mackay won't be available until August. Matthew James Lester, Tracey Nadine Hart, Kylie Ann Graham and Laana Shanae Hall are co-accused in relation to the alleged incident on January 15. All four are charged with torture, deprivation of liberty, assault occasioning bodily harm, two counts of robbery in company with violence and the unlawful use of a motor vehicle. Hart and Lester and also charged with arson, and Lester is further charged with administering poison with intent to harm. Magistrate Damien Dwyer said prosecution was "not clear" on when the brief of evidence, not including the DNA statements, would be available. Prosecution had indicated the material should be available in June, the Mackay Magistrates Court was told. Mr Dwyer adjourned the matters to May 1 so a date could be provided. Read more here: DNA in relation to torture case delayed until August … Continue reading →

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FDA OKs First-Ever DNA Alternative To Pap Smear

Posted: Published on April 25th, 2014

WASHINGTON (AP) Federal health regulators have cleared a genetic test from Roche as the first ever U.S.-approved alternative to the Pap smear, the decades-old mainstay of cervical cancer screening. The Food and Drug Administration approved Roche's cobas HPV test to detect the human Papillomavirus, or HPV, in women 25 and up. HPV causes nearly all cases of cervical cancer. Doctors already use such DNA-based tools as a follow-up to confirm Pap test results. But Thursday's decision means Roche can now market its test as a stand-alone option for cervical cancer screening, ahead of the Pap test. Roche supported its bid for expanded marketing with study results suggesting genetic testing is more accurate and objective at identifying cancerous growths than Pap smear which requires doctors to examine cervical cells under a microscope for signs of cancer. The FDA approval comes despite pushback from a number of women's health groups, who warned regulators that approving the DNA test as an alternative to Pap testing could lead to confusion, higher costs and overtreatment. More than a dozen patient groups raised those concerns in a letter to the FDA last week. Specifically, they said HPV-only testing could lead to overtreatment of younger women who … Continue reading →

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Bloody souvenir not from decapitated French king DNA

Posted: Published on April 25th, 2014

The DNA in the calabash belonged to a single person whose genetic signature, from northern Italy, was not 'compatible' with King Louis XVI's known, more central-European ancestry PARIS, France Two centuries after the French people beheaded King Louis XVI and dipped their handkerchiefs in his blood, DNA analysis has thrown new doubt on the authenticity of one such rag kept as a morbid souvenir. The contents of an ornately-decorated gourd alleged to hold traces of the king's dried blood has long been the subject of scientific disagreement, with tests throwing up contradictory results. On Thursday, April 24, a team from Europe and the United States said they had sequenced the full genome of the DNA in the squash, and found it was unlikely to be from someone tall or blue-eyed both features ascribed to the 18th century monarch. "The results of these analyses do not support the royal identity of the sequenced genome," the authors concluded in a study in the journal Nature Scientific Reports. Researchers have been trying for years to verify a claim imprinted on the calabash that: "On January 21, Maximilien Bourdaloue dipped his handkerchief in the blood of Louis XVI after his decapitation" in Paris in … Continue reading →

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