The Amelogenin gene is the gene that is responsible for the sex of an individual. The gene is found on both the X chromosome and the Y chromosome. The testing of this gene is very important in DNA testing as it will establish whether the samples provided belong to a male or a female and moreover, testing this gene safeguards against mistakes commonly made and is a means of quality control when people misplace the oral swabs in the wrong envelope during a DNA home test; for examples, they might put the mother’s swab in the envelope allocated to the father’s swab.

Many companies that aim on quality and reliability of results will test this gene along with other loci on the DNA samples provided. In forensics, testing this gene can also be extremely important as unidentifiable remains can be classified as male or female by testing this gene. In rare cases, this sex-gene on males happens to not be present on the X chromosome and not on the Y; in such cases male DNA will erroneously result as belonging to a female.

If you want to see how the gene is presented in a paternity test report then click here.