Its illegal and deadly black market trade. A specimen like this could sell for close to 400,000. Back. Finance is squared back. Hunting the hunters. Rhinos are gone, i think. Kosta grammatis is an engineer that designed everything from satellites through space to bionic eyes. Tonight he goes one on one with a bot. Forget about football, meet the science squad. Kids from a las vegas turning heads around the world. m an entomologist. Thats the team. Lets do some science. Hey, guys, welcome to techknow, im phil torres, joined by marita davison, and kosta grammatis. Marita, you met a man who spent years as a crime scene investigators for human victims. Now he and his lad is taking on the fourth largest industry in the world, its a tragic. Yes, we think of forensics dealing with human victims, we dont think of it as a bird. Its a Wildlife Services add, taking on the illegal trade in endangered species, problem. Some lines are extinct. How big is the industry. In terms of economic value, a 19 billion industry. Techknow had an inside look at the c. S. I. Forensic lab. Reporter the worlds Animal Kingdom is under siege. Since 1970 animal populations declined on average by half, according to estimates by the World Wildlife fund. A big driver is wildlife trafficking. Illegal trade in wildlife is a big global business, worth at least 19 billion a year. That makes it the fourth largest criminal industry in the world. Right behind drugs, counterfeiting and human trafficking. Its been connected to organised qaeda. The rhinoceros, one of the worlds iconic creatures is devastated by the black market trade. Less than 30,000 remain in the wild, down from ago. Rhinos are on the cusp of extinction. Joseph is from the u. S. Attorney generals office. The fact is with wildlife, if you get caught you see a slap on the wrist or a small crime. If you traffic cocaine and are caught, you do to prison for a long time. Reporter in 2012 he prosecuted jimmy and felix, a los angeles father and son team, suspected of smuggling millions of rhino horns. It was part of the operation crash, a nationwide crack down on rhino trade. It was destined for south africa, where rhino powder is thought to cure cancer. What was important was the wildlife trafficking between jim and felix carr, and the direct rise in murders, killings in the wilds of south africa. What crime lad do you turn to when the victim has four legs, and all you have is a severed horn . This one. The wildlife lab in oregon. Digits two and three on the white foot. Reporter its the worlds only crime lab invited to wildlife. It investigates cases for the u. S. , and other countries, relating to the convention on international trade. A treaty known as cites. Our job is to speak to the evidence. Ken is the lab director. He built it from scratch after a crimes. How would you say your work now is different from the work investigator. Police work is competitive. Here, we are making a difference. We can save species. We are pushing the envelope. The science starts when a package arrives. With it questions from a u. S. Fish and wildlife field agent. Often the first one is what is it . In the case of a horn smuggled by the carr, the first question was are they rhino . , this horn is made of keratin, the same stuff your fingernail is made of. On the black market its more valuable than gold or platinum. A specimen like this could sell for close to 400,000. Determining the species could impact the penalty. Some are more critically endangered, like black rhinos, wild. What are we looking at . The horns from the left are from a black rhinoceros, and on the right from a white. Rhinoceros horns are unique. Theres a big one. If you look at the base, theres not a hollow center. The skull itself has like a boney round portion and the horn sits on top of that boney portion of the skull. How would you determine one species of rhino from another by looking at the hornings . The one on the left is round in the front. You can see that. Flatter. This one is scared off here, difference. What if your evidence looks like this. Then you get carved objects, its difficult. You do not have any other landmarks characteristic of the rhino orn. This is the Deputy Director of the lab, and runs the chemistry unit. Theres a lot of plastics that resemble rhino horn, so our job is to look at the signatures and find out if its made of rhinoceros keratin or plastic. Once you have a positive idea next . We get it to d. N. A. Mary runs the genetics unit. Tracting dn extracting d. N. A. From a victim is one of the jobs. It ranges from caviar, pieces of meat, or matching a gut pile in the woods to blood on a car freezer. Its huge. World. In this case the lab had to analyse the d. N. A. Of 25 horns wildlife. We go in, and drill out close to the core of the horn. Its the closest material to what was going. We obtain tissue, crush it up and put it into a liquid that is a detergent that breaks down. How much harder is it to extract d. N. A. From Something Like a horn than it would be from a living animal. The d. N. A. Is in the harder matrix, you have to get the d. N. A. Out of the cells, but you areas. The d. N. A. Abstracted is compared with known samples at the lab. Its known as a noahs ark. The freezers behind us are tissues. Theres tissue, egg, bone, its the sauce material for getting the d. N. A. The lab identified 37 horns trafficked as rhinoceros. Its one victory in the battle to save them. In 2013 alone. Poachers killed more than 1,000 rhinos, a record high, and whopping 50 increase over the previous year. People have to understand what danger the creatures are in. Rhinos are gone. I dont think they stand a chance. They are worth too much. How do you deal with that . Reporter coming up, the carrs plead guilty, but does the punishment amount to more than a slap on the wrist . Reporter rhinos are being hunted to extinction. Defenseless against a crime that values the animals horns more than the species itself. Here at the lab that could come out of c. S. I. The tv show, here they are helping to put traffickers behind bars. The lab analysed dozens of coins in a swimming case against jimmy and felix carr. They were among thousands of its the lab investigates, all to protect wildlife. On this day the doctor is conducting an autopsy on a golden eagle submitted by a field agent. Often the animals are found dead, and thats the history that we have. We have to use skills, knowledge and senses to figure out what went on before the animal died. Extending from the right side of the test and down the medial aspect of the right leg is a tract of feather singeing. That suggests the cause of death was electrocution, possibly by a power line. In these photographs taken under a special forensic yellow light, the singed parts glow orange. Proof that the bird was electrocuted. Even bones can unravel mysteries, like the bear skull. The character of the hole through the skull, that it was bevelled on one side, and not as bevelled on this side. And the fact that this bone is discoloured around it. I can see that for sure. Its more indicative that that is a gunshot wound. Reporter if the bones are needed as evidence in court, the body is skeletonized not by a lab technician, but natures own cleaning crew. The labs colony of flusheating beatles can strip a carcasses clean in a matter of days. You are dealing with kind of the gory details here. Do you find yourself being personally impacted by what you see on the table . When i see something that indicates that there was suffering prior to death, and they are slowly wasting away and starving, thats when it gets a little hard. If i just think of everything as a stuffed animal, if you will, it makes it a little easier. The shock is the few times i have seen the animals grievously harmed, but not dead. The horn ripped off the rin oserrous, but its alive and moving around, that enrages me. I know that if i can keep this lab team right down the line, unbiased, good science, well help to take down the bad guys over and over again. The wildlife investigators will have us behind them, thats what we need to be. Operation crash is not about the poacher, but the middleman. Oftentimes we find specimens where the rhino has been long dead. Why do we want to bring those guys to justice . First of all, we want the trade stopped. I did make that cocaine in bolivia, we just transported it its the only way to stop the killing. Thats what we have to do. Jimmy and felix carr pleaded guilty to five felonies to smuggling rhino horns. They were sentenced to more than three years in prison and thousands in fines. John sees a links between their conspiracy, and the address in rhino deaths. If theres no profit, poachers dont go into the wild. The fact that jimmy and felix helped to create the market, made them morally culpable. For those people, it will purchase rhino horns. It would suggest that they have blood on their hands. Do you think the sentence and fine is enough to send a message to the rest of the people in the industry that they shouldnt be doing it. In my opinion i dont think its relative to the scale and magnitude. This is a huge industry, a big problem. If we are going to deter this activity, the penalties need to be a lot stronger. You hear the big bus for criminal activity or drugs, but you dont hear a lot about the industry. Rhino horn is literally like equivalent to a fingernail. Its keratin. I couldnt believe the value hand. I know. That is unbelievable that something to meaningless can sell for so much funny, and cause so much strife. I think thats the crux of the the issue here. Is that folks at the for examplics Lab Forensics lab, they are trying to make the activities have serious consequences. Thats one way to get at the problem. The other way is to take way the value that the its have for society. Its a bigger issue to tackle. Thats the only way to make a difference. Keep in mind this Forensics Lab is the one and only in the world, the one and only. 19 billion industry, and we are throwing one forensic lab at the problem. You can catch 20 people a year. Is that nearly enough to scratch of the surface . No. You guys, moving on to something that is tragic to something that is hopeful and fun. You have to play fridays by with the rob o. Designed by high schoolers, this Los Angeles Team got go all the way to china, but they are robots. Its a call story. Well check it out after break. At the height of the cold war were spies. Intercepting messages from embassies, military bases. One of the americas closest allies. We were not targeting israelis. Suddenly attacked bullet holes. Just red with blood. 34 killed. We had no way to defend ourselves high level coverups. Never before heard audio. A shocking investigation a conscience decision was made to sweep it under the rug. The day Israel Attacked america only on Al Jazeera America welcome back to techknow, im phil torres, joining me is marita davison, and kosta grammatis. For all of us being a scientist required one important thing when we were younger, and that was a mentor. I know for me it paved the way to being an intoe meteorologist. Me to. I had intoe mollo gift. Me two, i had mentors. I was in an Electronic Store hanging out with the owner, gadgets. That was it for you. After high school. You recently went to las vegas, to meet a mentor and his team of high schoolers. Vegas. I cant tell you everything that happened in vegas, but i will tell you that the kids at a high school there have invented invariable robots competing across the country and they travelled to china to bring the robots there as well. Its amazing. Lets check it [ singing ] reporter there may be high level rivalries between United States and china. But on this day in china, theres nothing of it between the two countries. They helped and showed how to get a good team work. Its about growing together. Its about helping everyone do what they can at the best of their ability. I think this is something that everyone can learn from. Young people from china and the United States working side by side sharing a common interest in robots. The team from las vegas, the 987 high rollers, were invited to share their expertise with chinese students. You think theyd be more advanced than us and technology. Its not a thing that they had. We went over there and control them. And see what they need to run teams like this. Its cool to bring something that we know well and bring it here and introduce them to it. You can see their faces when they see something new. Reporter back in las vegas, at the high school, its the love of technology in the robots that helped turn the lives of some American Teams around. This is not some top tier high school. No, we are a title one school. 50 of our students are on free or reduced lunch. We are a turn around school. Reporter what does that mean turn around . It means to find out why the Graduation Rate is falling. When we got here, graduation was 51 , now its 75 . Reporter programs like this is the reason . Absolutely. These are great kids. This sent the bit through the material, destroying it. Reporter team 987 high rollers is a workshop where kids spend seven days a week times, building bots. Schools grant sponsorships and they support the team and bring them 50,000 cnc machine. It fabricates parts about building robots. Right now we are going conservative on the machine. For the pockets, its a team. This team is every bit as popular and important as any other team on campus. The football team, the baseball team. Its on par with the athletics. Reporter like sports teams, they are proud of championships. The highly rollers brought in big teams. You turned down magnet schools to come to this school i think it was worth it. Reporter why. This team is unique in different ways, it has different machining equipment that no other school has access to, and mentors that are dedicated during and after school. And the best students from around the valley. Reporter success is due to stem education, science, technology, english and maths. Different. Intimidating. Reporter you wouldnt say. I wouldnt say its intimidating. We run a lot. Its 50 50 for the guys and the girls. We work as hard as they do. What happens if you use the wrong g code . You crash the part. Reporter who gets more done . The girls do. I started being around the shop, and i liked being around in the mechanical part of it. Thats how i go into inteeng an engineer. Being an engineer. On wednesday we say well learn to use the cnc machine, girls only. They know more than the guys. And when they know more than the intimidating. Reporter ladies night at the cnc machine. Exactly. Reporter what is intimidating is the themselves. Its more sophisticated than a car. Reporter the level of sophistication is astounding. Built in six weeks, they are designed to win, and they are built like tanks. They are programmed to complete a task. In this case, for fun. Throwing frisbees at a certain techno contributor. What you notice about this generation, this class of student, are they more sophisticated for technological understand, and are they appreciate and is there a cultural shift going on. I think theres a cultural shift. When i was at high school, being suicide. Reporter today, students involved in this programme are graduating with honours, many universities. Im thinking dismiss, a military academy. Im interested with what the round. Im looking at berkeley. Id like to be a maths teacher, come back and help this, mentor. Make a difference. What i love is that girls are front and center here, and they i love that part. The team is a 50 50 split of boys and girls. They have literally been ladies nights with the robot. They took their knowledge to china, and got to share it and experience. They didnt know how to articulate what they saw and felt. It was awesome, the food was weird. And the number one thing that i that was so powerful in that moment was how they talked about and made friends. They literally went to another country and were thrilled in finding a commonality. The chinese are no longer an elusive people, they are their friends now. I will it. Robots bring people together. I love it. Those are the moments that the show is about on techknow. We follow the science, wherever it takes us. If you want to see more, be sure to see more on techno. On techknow, we should not be having earthquakes in texas the true cost of energy hits home. My yard is gone. Are we destroying our way of life . Contaminated water from the fracking activities come here they stick it to the core of the earth but this Cutting Edge Technology could be the answer the future of fracking is about the water protecting the planet, saving lives. How do you convince a Big Oil Company to use this . Techknow, only on Al Jazeera America this is Al Jazeera America live from new york city. I am tony harris with a look at todays top stories. Everybody agrees our immigration system is broken. Unfortunately, washington has allowed the problems to fester for too long. Tomorrow night, president obama will announce an executive order to reform immigration. Is dispensing harsh punishment in retaliation for a violent synagogue attack in jerusalem, and a snowstorm blamed for at least five deaths in new york. Several more feet of snow is on the way