There may be occasions when laboratories detect contamination but are unable to determine the source.  These instances will most likely occur in negative controls and/or reagent blanks.  Unsourced contaminant profiles can be maintained by a laboratory for future comparison and can provide a mechanism for a laboratory to troubleshoot multiple occurrences of the same contaminant DNA profile.

For example, the laboratory may be able to:

• Isolate the profile to a specific consumable product
• Isolate the profile to a specific investigator(s)
• Isolate the profile to a specific staff member

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