Best described as a minute quantity of evidence found at a crimescene or upon an object relating to a crime, trace evidence is increasingly being used to ever more accuarately piece together and reconstruct crimes, as well as to describe the people, places, and things involved in them.
Foster + Freeman remain at the forefront of trace evidence examination and manufacture a collection of instruments that provide criminal laboratories with the ability to examine trace evidence including hair, glass, body fluids, blood spatter, soil, skin, metals, and paint etc. with ever increasing precision and microscopic detail.
Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) Instrument(s): ECCOEvidence type(s): Glass, metals, paint, tapes
Description: The technique utilizes a very high energy pulse laser to ablate a microscopic amount of material and raise its temperature by tens of thousands of degrees. As the various elements return to their ground states the excited matter emits a characteristic emission spectrum that can be measured and compared.
Raman Spectroscopy
Instrument(s): Foram, ffTA-1
Evidence type(s): Drugs, explosives, inks, fibres, plastics, paints
Description: Raman spectroscopy is a non-destructive technique that can be performed on trace amount s of evidence and is commonly used in the field of forensic science for the identification of unknown substances. Raman spectra exhibit numerous features specific to molecular structure which can give a valuable 'fingerprint' for comparing and differentiating materials. The need for a fast and effective instrument that requires minimal technical training has, in recent years, become even more pronounced as governments worldwide increase anti-terror measures.
Glass Refractive Index Measurement (GRIM)
Instruments(s): GRIM3
Evidence type(s): Glass fragments
Description: With so many criminal offences including burglaries, criminal damage, vehicle thefts, and road traffic collisions providing the potential for glass to be smashed it is vital that these minute fragments of evidence can be accurately measured, compared, and discriminated between. Refractive Index (RI) measurement is a highly accurate test that can be used to distinguish between a large number of glasses allowing investigators, in some cases, to buid an accurate map of a crime scene.
