Is it DNA?

IS IT DNA? IS IT HUMAN?

 

Over summer vacation, a good friend of yours, Jan, received the sad news that her grandmother had just passed away. Jan's grandmother left her a house just outside Roswell, New Mexico. You decide to go with Jan to Roswell to help her settle the estate and clean out the house.

While cleaning the attic, the two of you find a box engraved with the numbers "1947." The box is empty except for an 8cm x 10 cm piece of an unknown substance. It is extremely thin, silver in color, and less dense than water. The substance is so durable that it does not bend or dent.

On one side of the "metal" you notice a coating that appears to be organic. Because of the history of Roswell, you become curious as to the nature of the substance. If it came from a living organism, it should contain DNA and protein. You decide to have the mysterious coating analyzed to determine if it contains DNA and if it's human DNA.

   


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Sky Anderson
freese@inland.net
Date Last Modified: 8/29/99