Dramatic Growth In DNA-Based Forensics Doesn't Translate Into Job Opportunities

Government and private labs are springing up to accommodate expanded use of genetic evidence, but retraining existing workers. In less than a decade since DNA analysis brought forensic science into a new era, the growth of the discipline--as an evidentiary tool as well as an industry--has been massive, as more and more high-profile cases hinge upon the evidence it provides. Yet the phenomenal expansion of its use in courts around the United States is not translating into new entreprene

Written byKaren Young Kreeger

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Government and private labs are springing up to accommodate expanded use of genetic evidence, but retraining existing workers.

In less than a decade since DNA analysis brought forensic science into a new era, the growth of the discipline--as an evidentiary tool as well as an industry--has been massive, as more and more high-profile cases hinge upon the evidence it provides. Yet the phenomenal expansion of its use in courts around the United States is not translating into new entrepreneurial or employment opportunities, researchers and industry observers contend, for a variety of reasons.

"The bottom line is that the availability of DNA testing is increasing, and as the supply of labs increases, so does the demand," maintains Mark Stolorow, director of operations at Germantown, Md.-based Cellmark Diagnostics, a publicly traded business unit of pharmaceutical firm Zeneca Inc. that performs DNA analysis. "The demand is totally elastic."

To fill that demand personnelwise, ...

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