Differentiating between monozygotic twins through DNA methylation-specific high-resolution melt curve analysis

Stewart, Leander; Evans, Neil D.; Bexon, K.; Meer, Dieudonne van der; Williams, Graham

doi:10.1016/j.ab.2015.02.001

Cited by 41 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…Although the extent of these differences, and to what degree they are shared by different MZ twin pairs, is yet not understood, the potential of using DNA methylation to distinguish between MZ twins for forensic purposes has already been recognized [23][24][25][26][27][28], albeit via limited studies. In an initial study, Li et al tested blood DNA samples of 22 adult MZ twin pairs by using the Illumina Infinium Human Methylation 27K BeadChip array that allows for the co-analysis of 27,578 CpG sites, which revealed significant DNA methylation differences (377 CpG sites, methylation difference >0.17) [23].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Using a more targeted approach, forensic researchers have also explored the possibility of using differential methylation patterns within satellite DNA, and more specifically within interspersed repeats such as LINE-1 [26] and Alu sequences [27]. LINE-1 methylation was investigated in both blood and buccal cells from a total of 119 MZ pairs using bisulfite pyrosequencing.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Epigenetic discrimination of identical twins from blood under the forensic scenario

Vidaki

López

Carnero‐Montoro

et al. 2017

Forensic Science International: Genetics

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Monozygotic (MZ) twins share the same STR profile, demonstrating a practical problem in forensic casework. DNA methylation has provided a suitable resource for MZ twin differentiation; however, studies addressing the forensic feasibility are lacking. Here, we investigated epigenetic MZ twin differentiation from blood under the forensic scenario comprising i) the discovery of candidate markers in reference-type blood DNA via genome-wide analysis, ii) the technical validation of candidate markers in reference-type blood DNA using a suitable targeted method, and iii) the analysis of the validated markers in trace-type DNA. Genome-wide methylation analysis in blood DNA from 10 MZ twin pairs resulted in 19-111 twin-differentially methylated sites (tDMSs) per pair with >0.3 twin-to-twin differences. Considering all top three candidate tDMSs across all pairs in the technical validation based on methylation-specific qPCR, 67.85% generated >0.1 twin-to-twin differences. Of the validated tDMSs, 68.4% showed >0.1 twin-to-twin differences with qPCR in trace-type DNA across 8 pairs. Using an updated marker selection strategy, 8 additional candidate tDMSs were obtained for an example MZ pair, of which 7 showed >0.1 twin-to-twin differences in both reference- and trace-type DNA. Lastly, we introduce a high-resolution melting curve analysis of the entire fragment that can complement the proposed approach. Overall, our study demonstrates the general feasibility of epigenetic twin differentiation in the forensic context and highlights that the number of informative tDMSs in the final trace DNA analysis is crucial, as some candidate markers identified in reference DNA were shown not informative in the trace DNA due to various, including technical, reasons. Future studies will need to address the optimal number of epigenetic markers required for reliable identification of MZ twin individuals including statistical considerations.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Epigenetic discrimination of identical twins from blood under the forensic scenario

Vidaki

López

Carnero‐Montoro

et al. 2017

Forensic Science International: Genetics

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“…These differences in 5mC pattern can be identified by ultra-deep NGS as described by WeberLehmann et al suggesting a solution to paternity and forensic cases involving MZ twins (Weber-Lehmann et al, 2014). Apart from sequencing, HRMA experiment can be performed using bisulfite-converted/PCR-amplified DNA from both the twin's when one of the twin's DNA sequences having a greater number of methyl groups will show a different melting temperature (Stewart et al, 2015).…”

Section: Discerning Monozygotic Twinsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Crime investigation through DNA methylation analysis: methods and applications in forensics

Rana¹

2018

Egypt J Forensic Sci

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Discerning monozygotic twins, precisely predicting the age of human beings and most importantly interpreting human behavior remains a big challenge in forensic science. Modern advances in the field of epigenetics especially analysis of DNA methylation pattern can certainly help to identify and discriminate various single-source DNA samples such as bodily fluids collected from the crime scene. In this review, cytosine methylation analysis of DNA has been methodologically discussed with a broad range of applications in forensic science such as identifying single or mixed body fluid, discriminating monozygotic twins, age prediction, addiction/behavioral prediction as well as race/ethnicity identification. With the advances of next-generation sequencing techniques, blooming of DNA methylation datasets and together with standard epigenetic protocols, the prospect of investigating and solving these critical issues in forensic science is highly promising in the court of law.

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“…Twin identification by DNA analysis has been introduced in literature, provided that expensive facilities are accessible (Ollikainen, Smith, Joo, Ng, Andronikos, Novakovic & Craig, 2010;Stewart, Evans, Bexon, van der Meer, & Williams, 2015). Even those, it still is significant to twin identification.…”

Section: The Aims Of This Thesismentioning

confidence: 99%

Cross Models for Twin Recognition

Nguyen

Wan

2016

International Journal of Digital Crime and Forensics

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Nowadays, biometrics has become a popular tool in personal identification as it utilizes physiological or behavioral characteristics to identify individuals. Recent advancement in computer science has increased the accuracy of biometrics to a higher level. However, there are still a number of existing problems, such as complex environment, aging and unique problems. Twin identification is notably one of the most challenging issues, because they resemble each other in terms of biometrics. The similarity affects the use of biometrics in general cases and raised the potential risk of biometrics in access control.This thesis presents and compares four methods for twin recognition, namely, ear recognition, speaker recognition and lip movement recognition. Our results show that speaker recognition has the best performance with 100% accuracy. This is much higher than that of face recognition and ear recognition (with 58% and 53% respectively) while movement recognition that yields 76% accuracy.The objectives of this thesis are to investigate whether it is possible to identify twins between each other by using biometrics and find out which recognition approach is the best one. Comparing to the-state-of-the-art technologies, our work has taken a further step in twin recognition by using biometrics.In future, we will take behavioral analysis of twins into consideration, since their growing-up environment may have impact on their behaviors. We assume that other clues for twin recognition could be discovered from the behavioral analysis.

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Differentiating between monozygotic twins through DNA methylation-specific high-resolution melt curve analysis

Cited by 41 publications

References 8 publications

Epigenetic discrimination of identical twins from blood under the forensic scenario

Epigenetic discrimination of identical twins from blood under the forensic scenario

Crime investigation through DNA methylation analysis: methods and applications in forensics

Cross Models for Twin Recognition

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