New method reveals fingerprints on metal, plastic and glass.

Credit: CSIRO

The new method can reveal fingerprints on metal, plastic and glass.
By adding a drop of liquid containing crystals to surfaces, 
investigators
 using a UV light are able to see invisible finger-
prints "glow" in about 30 seconds.
Recent advances in identifying suspects is truly amazing.  There is, for example, 

  1. a new method for dating the age of a fingerprint allowing investigators to focus on current evidence rather than having to check out prints left prior to a crime.  There is 
  2. a new method of scanning fingerprints that shows not only the surface whorls and loops of a fingerprint, it shows underlying structures of the skin as well.  There is now 
  3. a method for taking fingerprints off ATM receipts and other paper documents.  And in some countries,
  4. babies are being fingerprinted at birth to build a database to be used to track medical care, but, has the potential to be used to identify people later in life.

And the list goes on.

 As a perpetrator caught by one of these new techniques might say, "What a world, what a world."

 Indeed it is.

 For writers of crime fiction or the many crime reality shows, this is a time of great breakthroughs that impact every story they write.  

 Here's the story with a link to Dr Liang's original paper in the attribution.
*  *  *  *  * 


Glowing fingerprints to fight crime

An Australian scientist who had his home broken into has developed a new crime scene identification technique to help fingerprint criminals. By adding a drop of liquid containing crystals to surfaces, investigators using a UV light are able to see invisible fingerprints "glow" in about 30 seconds.

The strong luminescent effect creates greater contrast between the latent print and surface enabling higher resolution images to be taken for easier and more precise analyses.

Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) materials scientist Dr Kang Liang believes that this technique could be used for more challenging evidence where conventional 'dusting' is not appropriate.

"While police and forensics experts use a range of different techniques, sometimes in complex cases evidence needs to be sent off to a lab where heat and vacuum treatment is applied," Dr Liang said.

"Our method reduces these steps, and because it's done on the spot, a digital device could be used at the scene to capture images of the glowing prints to run through the database in real time."

CSIRO's study shows that tiny crystals rapidly bind to fingerprint residue, including proteins, peptides, fatty acids and salts, creating an ultrathin coating that's an exact replica of the pattern.  "Because it works at a molecular level it's very precise and lowers the risk of damaging the print," Dr Liang said.

CSIRO tested the method on nonporous surfaces including window and wine glass, metal blades and plastic light switches, with successful results.

Fingerprint identification has been used as a key method by law enforcement and forensic experts for over 100 years. Adding CSIRO's method to the mix could save valuable time, costs and enhance investigations.

"When my house was broken into I saw how common practice fingerprinting is for police," Dr Liang said.  "Knowing that dusting has been around for a long time, I was inspired to see how new innovative materials could be applied to create even better results.

"As far as we know, it's the first time that these extremely porous metal organic framework (MOF) crystals have been researched for forensics."  MOF crystals have a number of benefits in that they are cheap, react quickly and can emit a bright light. The technique doesn't create any dust or fumes, reducing waste and risk of inhalation. CSIRO is looking to partner with law enforcement agencies to apply the technique.

Related stories:

  1. Breakthrough uncovers fingerprints on ATM receipts
  2. New CSI tool pinpoints when fingerprints were left behind
  3. New "Internal" Fingerprinting Technique Simpler, Cheaper & More Accurate
  4. Scanning babies' fingerprints: Tracking Health Care. Building a Global Database for???

Story Source:  Materials provided by CSIRO Australia.  Kang Liang, Carlos Carbonell, Mark J. Styles, Raffaele Ricco, Jiwei Cui, Joseph J. Richardson, Daniel Maspoch, Frank Caruso, Paolo Falcaro. Biomimetic Replication of Microscopic Metal-Organic Framework Patterns Using Printed Protein Patterns. Advanced Materials, 2015

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How the lives of Georgian gaolbirds and highwaymen shaped modern Britain

Image
Writing historical fiction requires solid research of available materials and databases.  The key word here is available.   So news of a new publicly accessible database that allows an author to research a very interesting past era is priceless almost beyond words.   I expect some exciting fiction to come out of this announcement. Here's the story, with a link to the source in the attribution. *  *  *  *  * London Lives, a landmark project led by Professor Bob Shoemaker from the University of Sheffield and Professor Tim Hitchcock from the University of Sussex, has uncovered a mass of extraordinary new evidence which reveals how the lives of thousands of 18th-century poor and criminal Londoners helped shape modern Britain. Based on evidence made available in a publicly available database, the study sheds new light on the everyday lives of thieves, prostitutes, vagrants, highwaymen, con-men, paupers and jailbirds, revealing how their daily fight for survival led to t
Read more

An unexpected way to recover from a breakup

Image
Breaking up is truly hard to do. And recovery from a breakup can be even harder. Your friends may counsel you to put the whole thing out of your mind. But new research suggests that repeatedly reflecting on a break-up -- even through participation in a research study -- actually speeds emotional recovery. "Breakups are ubiquitous -- most adults have experienced at least one in their life -- and are typically very distressing," says Grace Larson of Northwestern University. After studying divorce and breakups for years using longitudinal, multi-method designs, Larson and her then-adviser David Sbarra of the University of Arizona wanted to study whether these research techniques on their own were affecting participants. One concern they had was that the studies could be harming participants, Larson says. "At first glance, it might seem like repeatedly reminding participants that they had just broken up -- and asking them to describe the breakup over and over --
Read more

Greek Bronze Age ended 100 years earlier than thought

Image
Source: www.shef.ac.uk The charred remains of Assiros Toumba in Greece. Writing historical fiction set in the Greek Bronze Age?  Or simply enjoy reading this genre'?  Here's a study you may find interesting. C onventional estimates for the collapse of the Aegean civilization may be incorrect by up to a century, according to new radiocarbon analyses. While historical chronologies traditionally place the end of the Greek Bronze Age at around 1025 BCE, this latest research suggests a date 70 to 100 years earlier. www.weather-forecast.com Archaeologists from the University of Birmingham selected 60 samples of animal bones, plant remains and building timbers, excavated at Assiros in northern Greece, to be radiocarbon dated and correlated with 95.4% accuracy using Bayesian statistical methodology at the University of Oxford and the Akademie der Wissenschaften Heidelberg, Germany. Researcher Dr Ken Wardle says, 'These new results tell a story that is totall
Read more

Mood Instability and Your Characters

Image
You're putting together a character who's mood simply bounces all over the place, happy one moment, in a fit of rage the next.  Researchers at King's College London note that this sort of mood instability is part of a number of mental health disorders.  So how do you structure the personality and behavior of a character like this?  Below is the King's College report, along with a brief description from mentalhealth.com, of typical behavior, sometimes in the extreme, of a person who is very emotionally unstable.  This is offered strictly as a guide for crafting character in fiction - and NOT for the amateur diagnosis of the state of someone's mental health.  That is always best left to trained professionals. Another note about emotionally unstable behavior:  as any parent will tell you, this is how adolescents and teen-agers often behave.  It's a normal part of growing up - but it is a matter of degree .  In the extreme, however, this behavior can be diag
Read more

Remember faces but not names? You got it wrong.

Image
Source:   Daily Excelsior So, you think you're good at remembering faces, but terrible with names? New research has revealed we are actually better at remembering names than faces The cringe-worthy experience of not being able to remember an acquaintance's name leads many of us to believe we are terrible with names. However, new research has revealed this intuition is misleading; we are actually better at remembering names than faces. With the Christmas party season fast approaching, there will be plenty of opportunity to re-live the familiar, and excruciatingly-awkward, social situation of not being able to remember an acquaintance's name. This cringe-worthy experience leads many of us to believe we are terrible at remembering names. However, new research has revealed this intuition is misleading; we are actually better at remembering names than faces. The authors of the study, from the University of York, suggest that when we castigate ourselves f
Read more