How I Learned to Generate a Standard Curve Using a DNA Size Standard

First, we must understand what makes a student proficient in this area. A student is proficient if they: understand the purpose of generating standard curves, can plot the graph on semilogarithmic axes with distance migrated in milometers on the x-axis and the size of the DNA in bp on the semilog y-axis, the line of best fit is drawn through the data points, and the sizes of unknown DNA bands can be determined from the graph.

Now that we know what makes a student proficient, we can begin to talk about where I have applied these skills. In forensic DNA fingerprinting, I had to create a graph with all of the standards needed to be proficient.

Graph from Forensic DNA Fingerprinting

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