As the phrase suggests, DNA fingerprinting is a technique that can identify markers in human DNA that are as unique to an individual, organism or disease as the more common identifying marks for which it is named. In part because it only requires a small amount of material, it has blossomed into a nearly $10 billion global business. Unfortunately, its popularity has created a number of new vulnerabilities that have been dubbed “cyberbiosecurity threats,” as hackers seek their own share of this market.

To counter such threats, a team of researchers that include Dr. Ramesh Karri from NYU Tandon, and representatives from Duke University and Intel, have developed a genetic ‘barcode” that prevents these new hybrid attacks. As explained in a paper published May 14 in the IEEE journal  IEEE Transactions on Information Forensics and Security , the team used a technique called polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to repeatedly replicate the genetic sequences at these unique-DNA sites so that they can easily be read. Based on the specific combinations of nucleic acids at these various sites, genetic samples can then be matched to their sources.

To learn more about the process, you can read the NYU press release, which summarizes the work as a whole, or an article about the work in the National Science Foundation’s Research News. You can also find a link to the IEEE journal article here.