What makes fingerprints unique.

An international team of scientists discovered a unique way to develop fingerprints.

Initially, they conducted their study on mice and also on humans.

Identical twins in humans have different fingerprints because of that enhancement in sensitivity and grip. This mystery was then studied by an international team of scientists to determine how fingerprints differ from person to person. Later researchers tracked information in fetal mice that is Turing reaction-diffusion system.

Alan Turing in the 1990s, based on his research a system where leaves grow in a unique arrangement. There are few molecules that undergo cell growth in the system, and very few works actively to prevent it.

It was concluded that in adjoining cells, two forces were acting on one another which bridged ridges into a unique arrangement as stripes on a zebra. With time, the ridges started forming at three different points: the knuckle, the center, and the tip. Pulling against one another, whorls began to emerge at physical locations, resulting in randomness. Thus, identical twins have different fingerprints.

At the beginning, scientists described fingerprints as being identical to hair follicles. The only difference was they got the involvement of surface and cells were deeper.

Reference:

James D. Glover et al, The developmental basis of fingerprint pattern formation and variation, Cell (2023).

DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2023.01.015

By Priyanka Goswami