Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys, FRS, presented the 4th Shirley Boyde Memorial Lecture at 5:00pm on 19th February, 2008, entitled "Genetic Fingerprinting and Beyond".
Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys invented DNA fingerprinting in 1984, with applications in forensics and paternity/immigration disputes. Now he continues to refine his approaches to investigate human diversity and to understand how our genes contribute to the individuality of each of us. In this public lecture, he will be discussing how DNA fingerprinting has helped the fight against crime, observation of human evolution in real-time, and the impact of chronic radiation such as after the Chernobyl disaster. This was a rare opportunity for the Hong Kong public, including many secondary school students, to interact with one of the scientists who has made an impact on so many people's every-day lives.
Sir Alec was knighted for services to genetics in 1994.