Instituto de Ciencias Forenses 'Luís Concheiro', Universidade de Santiago de Compostela

Instituto de Ciencias Forenses 'Luís Concheiro', Universidade de Santiago de Compostela

R/ San Francisco s/n
15782 Santiago de Compostela
Spain

http://www.usc.es/gl/institutos/incifor/index.html

Scientific Lead

Prof. Angel Carracedo Alvarez
Phone: +34 (0) 88181 2215
Fax: +34 (0) 88181 2459

Contact

PubMed
ResearchGate

Project Staff

Prof. M^a Victoria Lareu Huidobro
Phone: +34 (0) 88181 2230
Fax: +34 (0) 88181 2459

Contact

Institute Presentation

The forensic genetic service of the Forensic Science Institute at the USC has been more than 30 years in the field of forensic genetics doing research and practical casework.

This Institute has been one of the most active groups in research in forensic genetics in Europe over the last 30 years. The scientific production of the group in forensic genetics is of more than 200 papers in the last 15 years, most of them in the most important forensic journals and a number of citations over 4000. The group had a leading scientific production in the field during the period 2001-2011 (in terms of overall impact factor, citations, H index and publications) (Thomson Reuters 2011).

Early in the eighties we introduced the silver staining methods for the detection of genetic polymorphisms (first protein and later DNA) after electrophoresis. Some of the microsatellites developed and validated by our group are now included in forensic kits used by all forensic labs and especially the new generation of multiplexes for DNA typing is including new robust STRs developed in this lab. We intensively work in mitochondrial DNA and Y chromosome typing contributing to the current use of these markers in case work.

During the last few years we concentrated the research work of the group in the development of SNPs (single nucleotide polymorphisms) in the framework of the SNPforID consortium. Research on SNPs culminated in a major role in the development of a single PCR SNP identification panel and a single PCR SNP ancestry panel as the principal output from the FP5 SNPforID group. Since this collaborative group's work was completed the group has produced SNP tests with forensic and genomics applications comprising: tri-allelic SNPs, X-chromosome SNPs, extended ancestry marker SNP panels, population admixture analysis SNP panels and human pigmentation SNP panels.

In 2007 the core SNP ancestry panel was used in the 11-M Madrid bomb investigation to successfully assign ancestry to 4 of 7 unmatched DNA samples.

More than 300 scientists from all over the world have participated in, and been trained in the work of this laboratory, including predoctoral and postdoctoral students from most of the countries in America and Europe and from several Asian and African countries.

Concerning standards the group has promoted the GEP-ISFG working group, we are members of EDNAP and AC has coordinated the EU project STADNAP (Standardization of DNA Profiling in Europe) and RIGEMAMEF (a network in Forensic Genetics for LatinAmerican countries).

The group has also participated in improving the genotyping infrastructure by running the Spain National Genotyping Center and the Galician Next Generation Sequencing Center.