DNA phenotyping is the use of genetic information such as DNA to determine a phenotype. It helps forensic investigator to predict the physical appearance of an individual to find unknown perpetrators or to identify missing persons using molecular analyses from biological samples in cases where all other means of inquiry, including conventional DNA profiling are non-informative. In a non-forensic setting, it permits the prediction of the physical appearance of our ancestors, historical persons or any other deceased individual for whom the identification of appearance traits may be interesting, and it sheds light on human evolution. Based on current research there are only a few traits for which it is possible to make an accurate description based on underlying genetic variation.
Eye color is a complex polygenic trait and is under the control of many genes. There are infinite number of eye colors with a multitude of patterns and mixtures. Almost 74% human eye color is under the control of OCA2 gene on chromosome 15. This gene correlates with the physical appearance of eye color as EVCs (externally visible characteristics) therefore it can be used as a parameter in forensic application.
Samples collected from local areas of Pakistan is divided into two groups brown that include samples from 17 individuals and other than brown including 15 individuals. DNA of 32 samples was extracted and samples were amplified against a selected sequence of OCA2 gene containing SNP rs1800407, which was previously reported to be associated with eye color in European populations. These amplicons were sequenced using Sanger sequencing and chromatograms obtained were analyzed by pairwise and multiple alignment tools. The results show the presence of5 polymorphic sitesin various samples including SNPsrs1800407 and rs1900758. These polymorphic sites were further analyzed by applying t-test which shows no significant association between retrieved polymorphic sites and eye color.The results show no significantly associated marker with eye color to be present within the selected sequence so we need to analyze other markers or SNPs which could be found to be associated with eye color that would be very useful in forensics application.