So you want to commit the crime of the century, but you're worried you might leave behind a telltale eyelash or some other vital DNA clue? Nostalgic for the good old days when the occasional fingerprint was all you had to worry about?
Well now your problems are solved!
Get your friend at the bloodbank to smuggle out 1000 different DNA samples (drops of blood). Then, you take all of the samples together and amplify them chemically until you have about a gallon of the mix.
1. Paint yourself from head to foot.
2. Let dry for 20 minutes.
3. Commit crime.
4. Go shower.
It's that easy! When the cops look for DNA, it'll be such a big jumbled mass that no one genome will stand out. Even if it can be resolved, there's still a thousand suspects to choose from.
If you like the results, go retail! Bottle and market DNA paint to all your criminal friends to amortize expenses. Make sure to re-randomize your mix periodically.
For added fun, throw in the DNA of exotic species of lemurs and sea urchins. Quincy won't know what hit him!-- jcatkeson, Jan 22 2004 i like it, but DNA is generally found under the fingernails of victims. So you'll have to make it extra-slimy, and not rince. Not to mention hair and general pilosity. Better solution would be to get samples of tissue and hair from the mortuary and sprinkle it around the crime scene. And to make sure you clean the fingernails of your victims before living.-- sidi, Jan 22 2004 Go to the blood bank. Sweep for finger prints. Then check phone records, or whatever.-- Tiger Lily, Jan 22 2004 The good idea would be to have it used in every crime scene around the country. In fact, There should be an assassin guild to organise these things-- sidi, Jan 22 2004 Gross.-- spacecadet, Jan 22 2004 //clean the fingernails of your victims before living//
Manicure, I presume.-- neelandan, Jan 23 2004 DNA is pretty fragile and probably won't survive on your skin for long enough. Also the contribution from your own DNA in the form of hair and skin cells will probably outweigh the masking DNA you added.-- hazel, Jan 23 2004 wear false fingernails and a wig. carry a cat.-- po, Jan 23 2004 This is obviously a stupid idea as I have watched enough episodes of Quincy to appreciate that he NEVER gives up until he has lectured the pepetrator into submission. You can't win that way.
Alternatively you could clone yourself and your criminal friends many times over, then send out your clone slaves to commit multiple crimes at the same time while you are busy establishing a watertight alibi. The resulting DNA data would be impossible to explain (without knowing about the clones). So you murder the clones and dispose of the bodies, leaving the whole DNA mechanism of crime detection in disrepute.-- dobtabulous, Jan 23 2004 Step One: Plan Crime of the Century.Step Two: Make a Friend at the Blood Bank Who Will Help You Commit Crime of the Century.Step Three: Have Your BloodBank Buddy Paint Your Nude Body.Step Four: Try Not to Get Too Distracted.Step Five: Let Dry Whilst Thinking Over Crime of the Century or Playing Whist.Step Six: Commit Crime!Step Seven: Shower With Buddy.-- k_sra, Jan 23 2004 I know some people (calling them buddies would be an exaggeration) who seem to consider showering the crime of the century.-- DrCurry, Jan 23 2004 That's NY for you.-- k_sra, Jan 23 2004 I don't think NY is for me, now-- Ossalisc, Jan 23 2004 Rather than painting yourself, perhaps a DNA aerosol bomb would be better.-- ldischler, Jan 24 2004 A variation on this idea would be to make a friend who collects pubic hair from mall bathrooms, and convert his collection into a ankle-length pubic hair coat. Commit your crimes wearing this coat and nothing else. Advantages:
1: Coat will shed a profusion of different pubic hairs, confusing the hair and fiber guys and letting the criminal get away with crime. 2: Appearance of criminal in coat will divert suspicion to Bigfoot. 3: Coat is easily removed, allowing for rapid postcrime leap into shower with appreciative pubic hair collecting buddy. 4: Doing crimes on moonless winter nights can get cold - and pubic hair coat is toasty warm!-- bungston, Jan 24 2004 And brought to you by the Keebler elves.-- Tiger Lily, Jan 24 2004 I gave it a crossie simply for the use of the word "amortize".-- Apologetic_Cynic, Jan 25 2004 Anyone seen Murder By Numbers?-- benlevi7, Jan 26 2004 I haven't. But have you seen Murderous Bunyons?-- Tiger Lily, Jan 26 2004 [k_sra], can I skip Steps One through Six?
[bungston] //and pubic hair coat is toasty warm//
I hope you don't know this from experience.-- GenYus, Jan 27 2004 you know... I can't think of a funny comment.. and don't want to put one here just to put one here...-- Ossalisc, Jan 27 2004 I think all that DNA would be better used to thoroughly contaminate a crime scene. Carry a bucket of the stuff with you, and splash it everywhere.-- DonBirnam, Jan 27 2004 The most used DNA recovering techniques use the PCR method whereby two short strands of DNA(primers) are used to make more copies of a identifying sequence on the target DNA. If you know the sequence of these primers (and you can, as they have to be revealed in court in previous cases) you only have to recombine these sequences with random DNA between the primers. A solution of this 'chaff' DNA will contain orders of magnitude more (nonsense) targets for the PCR reaction than any bodily fluid does (typically 2 copies per cell). that will easily drown out the original sequence, while needing much less dna to contaminate the incriminating sample. Any biology student trained in DNA recombination techniques will be able to construct such a solution, the expensive part is in ordering/obtaining the primers.-- nietsch, Mar 21 2004 Given what nietsch says about DNA fingerprinting using PCR is true, it would indeed be trivial to confuse any given primer scheme.
An easier (and cheaper) way to do this than nietsch's scheme would be to take advantage of a problem with PCR known as 'primer-dimers'. Basically short sequences are amplified more efficiently than large ones. This can sometimes happen because primers bind at low frequency close together or to each other. One could (for every PCR-primer pair) create an oligonucleotide which would immediately produce a very short product, basically guaranteeing the absence of any other bands. This would be very cheap, depending on the number of primers in use.
However, it has been suggested to me that a prior sample purification step might be performed to remove any small DNA pieces. This could be resolved by concatenating the 'anti-primers' into (one or more) larger sequences which would survive the initial processing. This could still be done easily within the budget of a master-criminal.
The rozzers would not, of course, take this lying down and would probably diversify their primer set. Thus there would be an arms-race between the pigs and crims.
Of course, this is all academic because if you're that organised a crime-lord you just burn down the forensic laboratory before initiating your crime spree.-- Loris, May 12 2004 either that or pay off one of the forensic techs... that reminds me i know atleast 1...-- engineer1, May 13 2004 random, halfbakery