To answer the question, “What is DNA Stutter?”, a few basics about DNA must first be understood.
DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) is commonly referred to as the building block of life. DNA contains everything needed to determine what an individual will look like. DNA is found in skin cells, muscle, brain cells, bone, blood, teeth, hair, saliva, fingernails, urine, feces, semen, organs, tissue and more. DNA is not found in red blood cells, but is found in white blood cells.
DNA looks like a long, narrow, string-like material. According to Donald E. Riley, Ph.D., “A one foot long string or strand of DNA is normally packed into a space roughly equal to a cube 1/millionth of an inch on a side. This is possible only because DNA is a very thin string.”
DNA strands are made up of four tiny, basic building blocks referred to using the letters A, T, G and C. These basic building blocks are called “bases”. A piece of DNA could be written as AATTGCCTTTTAAAAA. Remember, this is just a small piece of what would be an entire single strand of DNA.
Some pieces of a DNA strand contain known coding for the body’s cells. Other segments contain “junk DNA” or non-coding DNA that does not encode anything scientists know about. Coding and non-coding DNA can vary from person to person except in the case of identical twins, who will have identical DNA.
