This site was created to help show how a class full of college students can actually do a DNA test on puppies. The best part of all is that we know what we're doing while we do it!

 

At the University of Wisconsin- River Falls, a course can be taken called Lab Research Experience. Here, a handful of aspiring young Biology students work throughout the semester to determine one thing, the paternity of a litter of puppies. This semester (the spring of 2008) the test subjects are a litter of three puppies, their mother and two potential fathers.

 

But this is not going to be an easy test to do. Many things can and do go wrong with tests like this. Obstacles that come up in testing with DNA are things that not everyone thinks of. For example, when a litter of puppies is born, did you know that one father could have sired some pups, while another sired others in the same litter? Also, as with any DNA test when trying to prove "who did it", the only way to do so is by process of elimination. A DNA test cannot tell you exactly who did it, but rather exactly who didn't. To help you understand a little bit better, let's go through the example of the results of a DNA test.