Every piece of skin, hair follicle, eyelash and drop of saliva excreted from your body contains instructions written in a special chemical code. Technology has advanced enough that it is now possible to sift through bits of human DNA from the air, water or soil and decipher personal data about the people who left them, according to a new study.
Although it may seem helpful, the study’s authors warn that the community may not be prepared for the consequences.
“Every time we make technological progress, there are useful things technology can be used for and things technology can be used for,” says University of Florida zoologist David Duffy, who leads the project that tests the limits. sorting.. Human DNA from the environment.
“These are issues we’re trying to raise early so that politicians and society have time to develop the rules.”
The Earth’s surface is covered with discarded plant and animal cells and rotten microbes that shed what researchers refer to as environmental or “e” DNA. By replicating the tiniest bits of eDNA and reading the sequences, researchers can accurately compile an ecological inventory of organisms found in any habitat at a speed and cost that cannot be achieved by fieldwork.
In addition, these representative genetic samples can provide researchers with information that no other process can provide on its own, such as informing about the presence of diseases or relationships between populations.
All of this is well and good, whether zoologists extract long-lost genes from ancient sediments or look for signs of a mythological beast on Loch Ness. But this genetic broth necessarily contains bits of material left behind by humans. And unlike Nessie, people tend to be a little funny about someone spying on their genetic secrets.
While older sequencing methods have struggled to find meaningful human genetic sequences in eDNA samples, the process known as shotgun sequencing is not as limited as Duffy and his team have shown in their recent work.
The research team took water and sand samples from a riparian environment near the University of Florida’s Whitney Marine Biological Sciences Laboratory and Sea Turtle Hospital, as well as Duffy’s in Ireland. Their sample collection locations included an isolated island and a mountain stream away from human habitation.
Many of the chromosomal fragments they identified using the shotgun approach, called human genetic side-capture (HGB), contained identifying information about their origin.
Only the island and a distant river lacked human DNA, although traces of the research team’s own genes could be traced from footprints in the sands of the isolated island. Air samples from the university’s sea turtle hospital also contained eDNA traceable to staff, animals, and common animal viruses.
“Throughout this project, we were constantly amazed at how much human DNA we found and the quality of that DNA,” Duffy says. “In most cases, the quality is almost equivalent to when you sample a human.”
It is easy to imagine how such detailed genetic analyzes using HGB could be applied in the fields of epidemiology or population genetics. However, all sources of DNA identified in this experiment agreed to participate in the study in accordance with published genetic research ethics.
“It’s customary in science to make these shows public. But it also means that if you don’t review people’s information, anyone could come and collect it,” says Duffy.
“It raises the issue of consent. Do you need consent to take these samples? Or apply some kind of control to delete people’s information?”
Its usefulness as a forensic tool is a double-edged sword as it expands the methods of tracking individuals at the crime scene.
However, in light of the CSI effect, where DNA results are easily misinterpreted by a Hollywood-influenced jurisdiction, the legal implications of HGB identity also await full investigation. There are also concerns about how much public oversight needs to be expanded in the name of security.
“Of course, solving crimes is a good thing,” said Natalie Ram, a legal expert at the University of Maryland, who was not involved in the study.
“However, using inadvertently lost genetic information for research purposes risks placing us all under permanent genetic surveillance.”
We can imagine authorities keeping an archive of DNA fragments found at nearly every crime scene that some of us would not hesitate to be a part of.
Of course, this is far from the first time society has grappled with the ethical and legal issues of genetic rights. But the network of collecting personal genetic information is clearly growing, causing us to keep asking who has the final say on the unique code that defines us as individuals.
Source: Port Altele
