DNA Evidence

[Forum Admin]

Martha Jefferson Hospital is a teaching hospital, used to train doctors. Yes, in teaching hospitals it is common to keep tissue samples of certain cancers and diseases for many years, for use in research and training.  It had nothing to do with who she was, but rather the nature of her illness.  Even regular hospitals will keep pathology samples for years for routine re-analysis if need be, so yes your tissue samples are still stored most likely in your hospital. Remember, these are not the entire bits removed, but smaller portions, so they don't take up all that much room.

[Alixz]

FA - Thank you for your information.  I never thought too much about it until I read Peter Kurth's Anastasia - The Riddle of Anna Anderson.

People always talk about all of the coincidences that surrounded AA, and here is yet another.  Had she not had the operation for the cancer or not had cancer at all, there would probably have been no DNA to use for comparison.

Now that is something no one could foresee.  No matter how many people disbelieved her story, not one of them could have imagined DNA profiling as a way to confirm or deny someone's identity.

[Forum Admin]

Alixz,
Now add to the fact that the very FIRST time mtDNA identification was done, was the AA sample!! Dr. Gill decided it would be a good test case for his first try! There was simply NO WAY for anyone to know how it would turn out, since the sequences had never been done before.

[J_Kendrick]

Alixz,
Now add to the fact that the very FIRST time mtDNA identification was done, was the AA sample!! Dr. Gill decided it would be a good test case for his first try! There was simply NO WAY for anyone to know how it would turn out, since the sequences had never been done before.

Uh...  Just a small point...

Testing of the AA sample was not "the very FIRST time" that mtDNA identification was done.

The first was the match between Philip and Alexandra.

[Belochka]

It was a worthy beginning for scientific innovation befittingly served against AA's inglorious end!

Margarita

[Eddie_uk]

It was a worthy beginning for scientific innovation befittingly served against AA's inglorious end!

Margarita

Amen!!!!!:)

[Alixz]

I am suitably impressed.  True life is always stranger than fiction.