A type of genetic fingerprinting with a high chance of producing a false match has helped to convict six people in the US. The increasing use of this type of DNA evidence, based on DNA from the mitochondria of a cell, has sparked heated debate about whether it should -be admissible in court at all. The genetic fingerprints most people are familiar with are based on the DNA in the nucleus of the cell. Forensic scientists analyse more than a dozen different chromosomal regions, so the chance's of two people having the same fingerprints are extremely low—in the order of a million to one.
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