Date of Award
Summer 1992
Document Type
Dissertation - Restricted
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Mathematics, Statistics and Computer Science
Abstract
This thesis is concerned with the development of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) as an accurate and reliable measure of specific DNA copy number. This development is motivated by the need to quantify the number of copies of HIV in infected cells. In particular the extent of HIV infection, in terms of proviral load, can be determined by using PCR, leading to more accurate evaluation of drug treatments. Successful completion of this development requires answering the following questions: i) Can PCR be used to quantify low copy number of specific DNA? ii) What mathematical and statistical models give the most consistent and reproducible measure of DNA copy number? iii) What conditions affect assay variability?