Parabon NanoLabs

Parabon NanoLabs, Inc. is a company based in Reston, Virginia, that develops nanopharmaceuticals[1] and provides DNA phenotyping services for law enforcement organizations.[2]

History

Parabon NanoLabs, a subsidiary of Parabon Computation, was founded in 2008 by Steven Armentrout, Michael Norton and Christopher Dwyer. In 2018 Armentrout was the Chief Executive Officer and President of Parabon Computation.[1][3][4] Parabon NanoLabs has developed oncology therapeutics and synthetic vaccines using nanotechnology and DNA phenotyping.[1]

Products

Snapshot

Snapshot DNA Phenotyping Service is the name of a DNA phenotyping tool developed by Parabon NanoLabs which creates composite sketches based on DNA samples[5] The algorithms used to make the composites are not open source, however, which has attracted criticism from members of the scientific community.[5][6] Moses Schanfield, professor of forensic sciences at George Washington University, criticized the lack of any peer review, noting that there is no publicly-available performance record for the product.[4] In a 2016 article the American Civil Liberties Union recommended only using genetic phenotyping "...where the link between genes and external characteristics is based on well-proven, peer-reviewed, widely accepted science, such as is apparently now the case with hair and eye color."[7] However, North Carolina detectives felt Parabon's Snapshot DNA Phenotyping Service had been helpful in identifying Jose Alvarez, Jr. in 2015 as the killer of Troy and LaDonna French in 2012.[8] The United States Department of Defense provided approximately $2,000,000 in development financing for Snapshot.[9]

Keystone

Parabon NanoLabs was awarded a two-year contract by the United States Department of Defense to develop a software platform dubbed 'Keystone' for the forensic analysis of DNA evidence.[10]

Genetic genealogy

In 2018 Parabon NanoLabs appointed genealogist CeCe Moore as head of their genetic genealogy unit[11] and in cooperation with American law enforcement uploaded DNA evidence from crime scenes to GEDmatch in an attempt to identify perpetrators. Parabon said they found matches in 20 cases out of 100.[12] As a result of their work, William Earl Talbott II was arrested in May 2018 as a suspect in the murder of Tanya Van Cuylenborg and Jay Cook in 1987.[11] They also identified close relatives of Raymond Rowe, the suspect arrested for the 1992 sexual assault and murder of the schoolteacher Christy Mirack in East Lampeter Township, Pennsylvania.[13] They also identified two brothers, one of which should be the rapist and murderer of 12 year old Michella Welch in Tacoma, Washington in 1986. The police arrested and charged Gary Hartman, one of the brothers, using DNA from a discarded napkin. They identified the killer of 40 year old realtor Virginia Freeman in 1981 in Brazos County, Texas as James Otto Earhart executed in 1999 for another murder.[14] Police in Indiana worked with Parabon to try to solve the 1988 rape and murder of April M. Tinsley, and arrested in July 2018 a suspect, John D. Miller who then reportedly confessed to the crime.[15] Parabon also helped police with the arrest in 2018 of two suspects, Matthew Dusseault and Tyler Grenon, in the 2016 murder of 81 year old woman in Woonsocket, Rhode Island,[16] with the arrest in 2018 of Spencer Glen Monnett in the 2018 case of the rape, burglary and assault of a 79 year old woman in St. George, Utah[17] and with the arrest of Darold Wayne Bowden as a suspect for the serial rapes in Fayetteville, North Carolina from 2006-2008 (called the Ramsey Street Rapist).[18] They also helped police with the arrest in 2018 of Michael Henslick charged with the murder of 22-year-old Holly Cassano in 2009 in Champaign, Illinois,[19] the arrest of Marlon Michael Alexander for a series of rapes in 2007-2011 in Montgomery County, Maryland[20] and the arrest of Luke Fleming for the rape and murder of Deborah Dalzell in 1999 in Florida.[21] In 2018 they helped identify a deceased serial killer, Robert Eugene Brashers, who murdered Genevieve Zitricki in Greenville, South Carolina in 1990 and mother and daughter Sherri and Megan Scherer in Portageville, Missouri in 1998.[22]

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Company Overview of Parabon NanoLabs Inc". Bloomberg. August 2018. Retrieved 2018-08-03.
  2. ↑ Zhang, Sarah (September 22, 2017). "The Genomic Revolution Reaches the City Crime Lab". The Atlantic. Archived from the original on September 25, 2017.
  3. ↑ "Parabon Nanolabs and DNA Phenotyping". Nanalyze. April 30, 2015. Parabon Nanolabs is a private company that was founded in 2008 with a mission to create breakthrough products using DNA.
  4. 1 2 Schreiber, Melody (February 23, 2015). "Police turn to new DNA-powered technology in hopes of finding killer". The Washington Post. Retrieved September 24, 2017.
  5. 1 2 Gannon, Megan (April 12, 2017). "Amazing DNA Tool Gives Cops a New Way to Crack Cold Cases". NBC News. Archived from the original on September 25, 2017.
  6. ↑ Rogers, Kaleigh (November 18, 2016). "An Artist Who Uses DNA to Make Life-Like Masks Is Wary of Cops Doing the Same". Vice Media. Retrieved September 24, 2017. Dewey-Hagborg was also concerned that the software was not available to the general public to test, and Parabon hasn't published any research on its technology, but Armentrout told me the company has been working with third-party researchers to test it and publish the findings.
  7. ↑ Stanley, Jay (2016-11-29). "Forensic DNA Phenotyping". American Civil Liberties Union. Retrieved 2018-10-08.
  8. ↑ Augernstein, Seth (2017-01-05). "Parabon's DNA Phenotyping Had Crucial Role in North Carolina Double-Murder Arrest, Conviction". Forensic Magazine. Retrieved 2018-10-08.
  9. ↑ Cookson, Clive (January 30, 2015). "DNA: the next frontier in forensics". The Financial Times. Retrieved September 24, 2017.
  10. ↑ "Parabon NanoLabs Wins US DoD Contract to Develop Forensic DNA Analysis Platform". GenomeWeb. November 16, 2016. Retrieved September 24, 2017.
  11. 1 2 Zhang, Sarah (2018-05-19). "The Coming Wave of Murders Solved by Genealogy". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2018-06-12.
  12. ↑ Aldhous, Peter (May 17, 2018). "DNA Data From 100 Crime Scenes Has Been Uploaded To A Genealogy Website — Just Like The Golden State Killer". BuzzFeed News.
  13. ↑ Hawkes, Jeff; Knapp, Tom (June 25, 2018). "Raymond 'DJ Freez' Rowe arrested for 1992 killing of schoolteacher Christy Mirack". LancasterOnline. Retrieved June 27, 2018.
  14. ↑ Murphy, Heather (2018-06-27). "Genealogists Turn to Cousins' DNA and Family Trees to Crack Five More Cold Cases". The New York Times. Retrieved 2018-07-02.
  15. ↑ Tron, Gina (July 16, 2018). "DNA Leads To Arrest In Brutal 1988 Cold Case Murder Of 8-Year-Old Girl". Oxygen. Retrieved July 17, 2018.
  16. ↑ Milkovits, Amanda. "How DNA and a tattoo led to charges in cold R.I. murder case". Providence Journal. Retrieved 2018-08-03.
  17. ↑ DeMille, David (2018-07-28). "Arrest made in home invasion rape of elderly St. George woman". The Spectrum & Daily News. Retrieved 2018-08-03.
  18. ↑ Forin, Jacey (2018-08-23). "In Serial Rape Case That Stumped Police, Genealogy Database Leads to Arrest". The New York Times. Retrieved 2018-09-01.
  19. ↑ Shapiro, Emily (2018-08-29). "Genetic genealogy leads to arrest in 2009 murder of 22-year-old mother". ABC News. Retrieved 2018-09-01.
  20. ↑ Jones, Erica (2018-09-14). "DNA Database Led Montgomery Co. PD to Cold Case Rape Suspect". NBC4 Washington. Retrieved 2018-09-21.
  21. ↑ Augenstein, Seth (2018-09-19). "Genealogy Cracks 1999 Florida Rape and Murder". Forensic Magazine. Retrieved 2018-09-24.
  22. ↑ Gross, Daniel J.; Lafleur, Elizabeth; Cavallaro, Gabe (2018-10-05). "Greenville cold case solved: Jenny Zitricki killed by serial killer Robert Brashers in 1990, police say". Greenville News. Retrieved 2018-10-06.

Coordinates: 38°57′08″N 77°20′05″W / 38.95222°N 77.33472°W / 38.95222; -77.33472

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