SOVIET SCIENTIST SHARES DATA ON DNA PROFILING; FORENSICS LAB EXPERTS SWAP TECHNQUES

CAPE GIRARDEAU -- Thanks largely to the efforts of Robert Briner, crime laboratories across the country are benefiting from the knowledge of one of the Soviet Union's foremost authorities on forensic genetic technology.

The authority, Pavel Ivanov, is in Cape Girardeau this week visiting Southeast Missouri State University's Crime Lab, of which Briner is director. The visit here is part of Ivanov's two-week stay in the U.S. to lecture and exchange information about DNA profiling.

Ivanov is the senior scientist at the Institute of Molecular Biology at Moscow's Academy of Sciences. His specialty is DNA profiling and its application in criminal investigations.

Ivanov said Tuesday the scientific exchanges resulting from his visit to the U.S. will benefit crime labs in both nations.

"Here, I can speak with people, ask questions and obtain details and scientific books," Ivanov said. "Your technology here is very high.

"On my turn, I deliver a seminar and lectures about our work our successes and difficulties. So I consider it a scientific exchange."

Briner, who visited the Soviet Union last summer with a group of American forensic experts, said Ivanov's visit also serves to foster goodwill between the two nations.

"In this day and time, we need to learn that people are essentially alike all over the world," Briner said. "The more we can learn, the more we can understand different people."

Briner said that when he visited the Soviet Union he was impressed with the people's friendliness and knowledge of DNA technology.

The use of DNA profiles to identify criminals developed here in the early 1980s. By comparing genetic characteristics of samples taken from a crime scene with those taken from suspects, scientists and forensic experts are able to accurately identify criminals by their distinct DNA "fingerprints."

Ivanov said the technique was developed in the Soviet Union about three years ago.

"We are not newcomers to the field, but we're interested, to look at American technology," he said. "You have a very high level of scientific research and technology."

Ivanov said he became interested in the scientific exchange after he met Briner last year in the Soviet Union.

Briner "arranged my visit to this lab and helped arrange my other visits here in the United States," he said. "He was really instrumental in my being able to come to the United States."

Ivanov's trip includes stops at the biochemistry department at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, Southeast's chemistry department, and police criminal labs in Illinois, Missouri and Kentucky. The three-week visit also includes trips to New York City, St. Louis, Kansas City, Omaha, Neb., and Berkley, Calif., where he will give lectures.

Ivanov also attended the International Symposium on Human Identification in Madison, Wis.

"It's my first visit to the United States," Ivanov said. "It's a great historical opportunity to see your country and your people."

Briner said the trip wasn't easy to arrange and sponsors had to be secured to pay for Ivanov's travel through the U.S. The American Chemical Society's southern and St. Louis sections helped to pay for his travel, said Briner.

He said Ivanov also has a friend at the medical school in Omaha, so a trip was arranged there. Trips to Berkeley and Kansas City also were arranged by friends of Briner interested in meeting Ivanov.

Briner said of the exchange: "If it isn't the first time, it's one of the first. It was challenging to say the least."

Briner said the exchange will benefit Southeast, which plans to establish its own DNA lab.

"Basically, we'll benefit by understanding new techniques," he said. "Some of the techniques he uses, I don't know that anyone in the U.S. is using. That's always helpful. Whenever scientists exchange information, it's truly an exchange."

Ivanov said that although the Soviet Union has the technology to use DNA profiles in criminal and civil cases, the technique is used sparingly because of its cost.

"We have some problems with equipment," he said. "The equipment is available, but we have to import a lot of it, and it's very expensive."

Ivanov said the U.S. and Soviet forensic experts use different DNA techniques, but with the same basic result.

"We can identify a person using biological evidence on the crime scene. Stains, for example: we can compare the stains with a blood sample from the suspect," he said.

"There will be a picture, a DNA fingerprint, that's not like the classical fingerprint. But with it we're able to match the suspect with the evidence.

"We use this technology to determine paternity in civil cases and in cases of violent rape that result in the birth of a child."

Ivanov said the DNA method of identification is extremely precise and accurate. "There's a possibility of one in 30 billion of two people having matching DNA profiles," he said."

Ivanov said that although scientific exchanges between the U.S. and Soviet Union are easier now than they were a few years ago, the trips still aren't common.

"It is easier for scientific exchange now because there's no political restrictions." he said, "But we have financial difficulties."

Ivanov said he's enjoyed the cultural as well as scientific education he's received in the U.S.

"I've enjoyed it very much because you have very nice people here," he said. "Your life is quite different from ours, including the food, cars, buildings and so on. I think, though, the people are very nice."

"It makes us appreciate what we have," Briner said. "We take a lot of things for granted.

"I think we've gotten over the idea that Russians all have horns and pointed tails, even though we might have been taught that for years; and they were taught the same thing about us.

"But I think we're finding out that people are the same all over, and that we can learn from each other if we approach it as something that's positive."