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Applying the science: Identifying victims after Sept. 11

As the World Trade Center continues to smolder, forensic labs utilize the latest DNA technology to attach names to the remains of the thousands of people killed in the attack.

By Victoria Stagg Elliott, amednews staff. Dec. 3, 2001.

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Mapping Disease
As the results of the Human Genome Project began to shake out into clinical applications, this 2001-02 series detailed progress in the prevention and treatment of a variety of diseases and conditions -- both on the near horizon and possibilities far into the future.

By mid-October, there were 9,400 separate pieces of biological remains collected by the New York City Medical Examiner's Office and more coming in every day.

Out of that amount, 4,000 bone fragments had been sent to a private lab, half so charred and degraded that the DNA vital to confirming the identities of those missing may never be extracted.

There were also 1,300 cheek swabs collected from relatives outside New York City and thousands more from within the city -- all carrying with them the possibility of a DNA match to identify another victim.

These are just a few of the numbers associated with the World Trade Center DNA identification project, the largest of its kind in the United States and paling only in comparison to efforts to identify the thousands who were massacred when Yugoslavia fractured in the 1990s.

It is a daunting mission. And no one is willing to talk about the costs, except to say that the project will tally more than $1 million and less than $1 billion. Public agencies involved say they can't know until all the samples are in. And private companies are providing their services free of charge or at a significantly reduced rate.

"It's a lot of money," said Robert Shaler, PhD, director of forensic biology with the New York City Medical Examiner's Office.

For those involved, it's overwhelming. Lab workers are putting in long hours sorting the remains as they determine which ones are the most likely to yield useful DNA. Some days, those at the site hit a pocket and the forensics laboratory receives hundreds of bits of bone and flesh. Other days, the office receives less than a hundred pieces, still warm from the fires that continue to burn. [...]