Development of a highly sensitive sex determination method using the novel primer set

2023 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 20K18803
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Early-Career Scientists
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: Basic Section 57080:Social dentistry-related
• Research Institution: University of Yamanashi
• Principal Investigator: FUJIMOTO Kana 山梨大学, 医学部附属病院, 医員 (30866489)
• Project Period (FY): 2020-04-01 – 2024-03-31
• Keywords: Amelogenin / DNA / Exons

Outline of Final Research Achievements

In this study, we focused on the exon 1 region of the amelogenin gene, which has very little polymorphism other than sex differences. We developed a primer set for sex determination and compared it with the GlobalFiler PCR Amplification Kit (GF), which is widely used for forensic DNA typing. The results showed that the amount of DNA required for accurate sex determination was 25 pg for both methods, achieving equivalent sensitivity. Next, we compared the two methods using ancient human skeletons and found that the present method with its shorter amplicon was considerably superior to GF. The present method is simple, rapid, inexpensive, and suitable for analyzing highly degraded samples.

Free Research Field

Sex determination

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

身元不詳遺体の性別判定は、個人識別上重要な鑑定事項である。特に、DNA解析による性別判定は、形態人類学的特徴を利用できない試料にも適用でき、有用性が高い。法医DNA鑑定で取り扱う試料は環境要因や微生物の影響をうけ容易に分解されるため、高度に変性した微量な試料から正確に判定を行うことが求められている。
本法は高度変性試料についても適用可能、かつ手技が簡便で迅速、安価であり、法医科学及び自然人類学に貢献できると考える。