Is Alu a good marker in forensic science?

Question

why and why not?

i heard its like a thumprint where it is unique in everyone..so can catch culprits/thiefs easily?

anymore?

Answer 1

Yes, it is a good marker.  There are many alu sequences throughout the genome.  They're short, repeated sequences that are unique to an individual, like a thumbprint.  Also, some people have them, some people don't.  If you did PCR on a region of DNA with an Alu element, you would see diffferent bands appearing for different people, depending on whether the person is homozygous dominant, homozygous recessive, or heterozygous for the Alu sequence.  People will inherit one allele from each parent. I believe the Alu sequence is found in all primates, but it doesn't actually code for anything though,so it's classified as "junk dna".