Long before Arthur rode into battle with his crest flying at the vanguard, symbols have been the preferred way to tell the world who we are and what we stand for.  Today we call them logos.  I like crest better because it suggests something of deeper meaning.  Families had them, towns and kingdoms united and stood beneath them.

It is the human condition that every new project, be it a large company or small group of companions off on an adventure, starts with an idea.  The ‘idea’ has been used for comedy skits – “Hey y’all watch this…” – and of course is the very essence of scientific legend – apples and gravity for instance.  Our idea started with a need to solve a problem that we saw as crucial to the advancement of our field.  The quest for our artist was to create a visual symbol that conveyed our passion for our work and the idea we were championing.  Consequently it seems like a good way to open our blog by talking about our idea and the way to convey it to the world.

Our idea comes from the need to solve the mixture puzzle.  After all, what has the journey of genetic identification been but one scientific puzzle with some six billion pieces.  Pieces that are mono-chromatic in the forensic mission to aid in the solving of crime, one dimensional in its use of DNA length, and with lots of pieces laying on the table mixed together without any real clue as to the place they may fit. Mixed DNA samples – puzzles that are remarkably difficult to solve and the current technology is akin to lining up every piece and trying each in sequence.  And even if you fit a few together they are often an island of pieces in a sea of singles.  Like those thousand piece mono-chromatic puzzles, when you’re done, you’ve constructed an enormous white, cardboard-backed canvas. Upon closer inspection though, you begin to see a barely perceivable pattern of many off-white shapes which when studied in the right light begin to form hues, then shapes, and then slowly, bit by bit, meaning. Until finally you’ve got a story, a picture.  A puzzle, like any scientific pursuit, involves method, trials and set-backs, patience, and determination to solve.  It also requires an ability to change your perception, your point of view, and your bias.   Simply put, the puzzle piece is the basis for our work.

What’s next? Casework Genetics combines technology with genetics.  Not just any genetics – complex mixtures which for so long have been a white canvas on a cardboard backing. Mixtures which were sometimes un-solvable.  DNA so intertwined that 13 loci couldn’t possibly help you find your way out of the identity labyrinth.  But what about a million loci?  More data, a different view, a new perception.

So far?  A puzzle.  DNA mixtures.  A new technology which provides the map.

CASEWORK GENETICS, CG, one base pair, a single starting point, a mathematical locus.  Not a length of DNA but a single well defined point among three billion others.

As for the logo?  If we place these letters here, or here, or here… Are they obviously our initials?  How big should the rest of the letters be?  Should it be an acronym followed by the complete word or should it remain as it stands with the short form a part of the puzzle and the rest of the company name boldly following suit?  What about us?  The people of CG?  We are not Arthur and his knights, but on a number of occaisions we have felt like pirates.  We left that to the artists.  We gave them lots to work with and we are astonished and pleased with the results.

Our logo, like a crest, stands for who we are.  The team unfolding at Casework has a drive to discover, a curious and insatiable scientific appetite.  We have new technology to guide us, to be pushed and questioned and combined with a rich history.  There is much to share and there will be much to discuss in the future.  This puzzle is too exciting to keep to ourselves.

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