Posted By:	Colleen Taylor
	Email:
	Subject:	And now, the rest of this story!
	Post Date:	August 07, 2000 at 19:36:34
	Message URL:	http://genforum.genealogy.com/james/messages/6051.html
	Forum:	James Family Genealogy Forum
	Forum URL:	http://genforum.genealogy.com/james/

Dr. David Glenn Smith, Department of Anthropology, University of California at Davis wrote the following to me on 27 July 2000: "I can tell you exactly what I told Betty about my reaction to the Prinz report. I have studied many, many STR loci, including most of those on the Y-chromosome that Dr. Prinz characterized, but not (admittedly) the DYS385 locus that yielded a mismatched between the Courtney and Haun DNA sample. As you might know, the DYS385 locus has 72 reported alleles, probably because its mutation rate is so high. Before I read Dr. Prinz's report, I had told Betty that I thought the liklihood of a mutation (given what we know about the mutation rate of STR's and the small number of generations separating the SNA samples (of Courtney and Haun) from their alleged common ancestor was quite low. After I read the report I told Betty that barring technical errors (which I have no reason to suspect) that I would have come to the same conclusion as Dr. Prinz. Morever, the structure of the presumed mutant allele was as we would expect of a mutant (i.e. it differed by only a single repreat motif from the non-mutant form), based on how we believe STR genes evolve - it is noteworthy that technical errors of PCR amplification can lead to the same (Pseudo-mutation because the Taq-polymerase enzyme slips in the same was that stuttering can introduce a variable numbers of repeats of the same sound. In the case of Taq-polymerase, however, we typically observe only a single extra repeat motif stutter, seldom more than one single mismatch. Thus, this is consistant with Dr. Prinz's conclusion that the single mismatch between the Haun and Courtney DNA is more likely to have resulted from a mutation than from an absence of share patrilineal ancestry." In other words, this forensic expert -- this same expert that Betty Dorsett Duke has sent hair samples and worked with on a close basis -- confirms Dr. Mechthild Prinz's conclusion. Now, Betty, what was the name of the forensic anthropologist or DNA expert you reference in your statement?