Efficiency of DNA recovery from fingerprints enhanced with black and magnetic powders

Given the fragility of fingerprints, even after development with suitable dactyloscopy techniques, failure in identifying its authorship may occur. In these cases, studying the DNA transferred during fingerprints deposition may represent a timely approach. We aimed to determine the feasibility of obtaining a genetic profile after fingerprint enhancement with black and magnetic powders commonly used by forensic experts on glass surfaces. Samples were processed with NaCl 0.9% as a collection solution, lysis solution methodology for DNA extraction followed by purification and concentration with Amicon (R) 100 column pretreated with 2.0 ng Poly An RNA. A set of fingerprints was initially profiled using CS7 PowerPlex (R) Kit ( Promega). Preliminary results indicate that for glass surfaces, black powder is a better technique of choice whenever dactyloscopy features do not provide a successful identification, and genetic analysis is required for this type of evidence.