Mammalian species identification by interspersed repeat PCR fingerprinting

Most DNA methods for species identification of animal tissues test the presence/absence of one species per assay, requiring several tests for a complete analysis and prior knowledge of the species that are potentially present in the sample. Here we demonstrate that PCR with fluorescently labeled MIR (mammalian-wide interspersed repeat) primers generate fingerprints that are suitable for rapid identification of known and unknown species on an automatic sequencing apparatus and with computer-assisted data processing. The method allows the analysis of processed meat samples and offers a convenient alternative to sequencing of mitochondrial DNA.