Stronger paternity test results.

Including the biological mother in any DNA paternity test strengthens test results. Whenever possible the mother should subxmit DNA samples as a participant. Testing the mother's DNA increases the likelihood of a conclusive result for any DNA test - including DNA tests for paternity, siblings, or grandparents.

Why including the mother produces stronger results

A DNA paternity test analyzes up to 15 locations looking for matches between the alleged father and child. The markers must reflect a match or the alleged father is not the biological father. Each match receives an individual paternity index value indicating the strength of the match; the more unique the match, the higher the index. The probability of paternity is calculated into a Combined Paternity Index (CPI) - using all of the paternity index values from the individual markers.

Most DNA paternity tests that examine only an alleged father and child show a conclusive probability of paternity: usually 99.99% when the alleged father is included as the biological father or 0% when he is not the father. In some cases, the matches between an alleged father and child provide an inconclusive result. In such instances, IDENTIGENE requests DNA samples for the biological mother. If she is unavailable, the test result remains inconclusive. With the mother, DNA paternity testing almost always provides a strong, conclusive result. Even when results are conclusive, including the mother further strengthens the DNA test conclusion.

Paternity Test Case Studies

For example, consider the following case:

Locus	Biological Mother (not tested)	Alleged Father	Child	Parentage Index
D2S1338	--	12, 13	10,12	1.845
D2S1358	--	8,11	11, 14	2.714
D8S1179	--	21.2, 32	19, 21.2	2.675
D19S433	--	15, 18	12, 15	7.338

In this case, the probability of paternity is 98.2896% (the product of all the parentage indexes). The result is inconclusive (because it must be greater than 99% or 0%), yet the alleged father and child match at all locations. Now, add the biological mother's sample to the DNA paternity test:

Locus	Biological Mother	Alleged Father	Child	Parentage Index
D2S1338	8, 10	12, 13	10, 12	3.489
D2S1358	14, 17	8, 11	11, 14	5.114
D8S1179	15, 19	21.2, 32	19, 21.2	3.619
D19S433	8, 12	15, 18	12, 15	15.309

The probability of paternity increases to 99.9541%. Why? In the first example, one of the two markers from the child and alleged father match at each location. However, we don't know which of the child's markers comes from his mother and which must come from his father. By testing the child's mother, we see which of the child's markers must have come from the father. In the second table, the paternity index is increased.

Not only does the child match the alleged father, but the match is with the marker that must have come from the child's true biological father (since we can see which marker came from the child's mother). In fact, the index value is higher at each location because the biological mother participated in the DNA test.

IMPORTANT: Including the biological mother in any DNA test, even grandparent or sibling DNA testing, similarly strengthens the DNA test results probabilities.

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