Proving paternity

[netibiza]

How can one go about proving paternity if both parents are dead.  There are 7 siblings - all definitely with the same mother - 5 def with same father - could it be proven either way for the other two using the mother's mitochondrial dna - and then matching or not, the dna from the father.  Do you see what I mean?

[WoWo]

Don't know an of the scientifc details but I think the fathers DNA is easy to identify and it would be relatively easy to do this.

[Peter Pedant]

yeah definitely feasible - Net. If the answers are going to have legal significance, then you should do it through official channels - just to save future litigation.

Mt DNA in everyone comes from the mother in the ovum. The head of the sp**m has no mt so there is no paternal contribution to mt DNA.

Now.... everyone has 46 chromosomes, 23 from each parent BUT BUT all 23 have mixed and matched in a process called meiosis. = reduction division. so basically Netibiza 23 of your chromosomes are not identical to 23 of your mothers but are clearly derived from them.

With 7 children there should be no problem on standard genetic mapping working out who has come from whom.

[netibiza]

Thank you both - it's a bit clearer now.  Nothing legal involved, we are just one big happy family, but we just wondered.