Welcome to the Department of Forensic Molecular Biology of the Erasmus MC University Medical Center Rotterdam

The Department of Forensic Molecular Biology, established in 2004, is a joined initiative of the Erasmus MC University Medical Center Rotterdam, the Erasmus University Rotterdam, and the Netherlands Forensic Institute (NFI). We use state-of-the-art technologies to address topics within human molecular biology and genetics that are of fundamental scientific interest and at the same time provide potential applications to forensic sciences. A successful project i) deals with an important forensic question that currently cannot be answered, ii) starts with basic molecular research, iii) discovers new scientific information, iv) uses this knowledge to develop a new molecular test system, and v) finally delivers a forensically validated tool suitable for practical application to forensic case work, which answers the forensic question of interest. The outcomes of the various steps are published in peer-reviewed journals either on general science, or biological sciences, or forensic sciences.

Research topics are initiated by more current issues in forensic molecular biology such as the identification of the cellular origin of a crime scene sample, or the identification and interpretation of a male component using Y chromosome genetic information, or the inference of bio-geographic ancestry from DNA. But also by more future issues, such as estimating the age and deposition time of a crime scene sample or the use of genetic information for predicting externally visible characteristics of unknown DNA donors. We are also interested in lethal disorders and conditions that usually do not leave detectable signs in medico-legal autopsy for which we aim to provide molecular insights into disease aetiologies and the development of molecular diagnostic tools. Furthermore, we use genetic variation to investigate relationships, origins and the migration history of human populations and are interested in detecting footprints of local adaptation and natural selection in the human genome.

Our department is member of the Forensic Genomics Center Netherlands (FGCN) and the Netherlands Consortium for Healthy Ageing (NCHA), both sponsored by the Netherlands Genomics Initiative (NGI) / Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO).

Selected recent publications:

• Kayser M and de Knijff P (2011) Improving human forensics through advances in genetics, genomics and molecular biology. Nature Reviews Genetics, 12(3):179-192