Forensic identification of missing persons using DNA from surviving relatives and femur bone retrieved from salty environment

Human identification using forensic DNA profiling has made enormous advancement over the past two-and-half decades. Forensic DNA profiling provides enormous genetic data from a variety of biological materials and individuals to help solve many important criminal and civil cases that confront society. Under certain environmental conditions, the total deterioration of soft-tissue leaves skeletal remains as the only available sample for DNA testing to identify missing persons, victims of natural disasters, or exonerate suspect(s) in a criminal case. We report the findings of a case involving the human remains of a missing person submitted to the Forensic Science Laboratory of the Ghana Police Service for forensic DNA profiling in comparison to an alleged living relative of the deceased. DNA from the femur bone and buccal swabs of alleged relative of the deceased were extracted, quantified, and short tandem repeat (STR) profiled using Qiagen's Investigator kit, Applied Biosystem's Quantifiler trio, and GlobalFiler kits. Full STR profiles were generated for both the femur bone from the salty environment and the buccal swabs from the alleged relative. The femur bone was genetically identified to be that of the missing person. The remains were thus handed over to the relatives for final funeral rites and burial to bring closure to the long search for the missing person.