Australian Facility News Today

The location of human remains is performed primarily through the aid of cadaver detection dogs, which rely on the malodour produced through decomposition of decaying bodies. Malefactors will attempt to conceal these putrefactive odours through chemical additions such as lime, which is also wrongly believed to accelerate decomposition and prevent the identification of the victim. Despite the frequency of lime in forensic applications, to date no research has been performed to determine its effect...

An engineer, a scientist and a retired FBI chemist-turned-professor are hoping to find where the 19-year-old's body is buried and are using volatile organic compounds found in soil to help them search.

Behind a razor wire-topped fence in far western Sydney, a world first research experiment on the dead that could help police solve murders is taking place at a secret bush facility.

Entomological evidence is commonly used to estimate a post-mortem interval (PMI) in medicolegal investigations of deceased individuals. A PMI from insect-derived data can be estimated by either examining the thermal development rates of larvae or analysing the carrion insect succession process. The larval development method is well-established and reliable, while the succession method is less reliable as it depends on the predictable sequences of species arriving at a cadaver, which is a highly ...

Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) is a geophysical tool that images the subsurface and has gained acceptance across a myriad of fields. It is because of this non-destructive method that GPR has been used effectively in archaeological and forensic prospection to locate unmarked or clandestine burials where minimal disturbance is imperative. Prevailing scenarios that are commonly seen in both forensic cases and the archaeological record are the use of both lime (CaO or Ca(OH)2) and gypsum (CaSO4.2H2O...

“Green death” trends have emerged in the funeral industry to respond to people’s growing concerns around the ecological burden of traditional burial practices.

A UK human body farm could help put murderers behind bars and stop them from killing again, says a forensic expert formerly at Staffordshire University in Stoke-on-Trent.

A UK human body farm could help put murderers behind bars and stop them from killing again, says a forensic expert formerly at Staffordshire University in Stoke-on-Trent.

Abstract Traditionally, the post-mortem interval (PMI) is determined using methods such as forensic entomology or forensic pathology, however, these techniques are often limited to a particular post-mortem window of up to 72 – 120 h after death. In this study, lipids extracted from decomposing human tissue were investigated as potential soft-tissue biomarkers of PMI. Tissue samples were collected from two whole human donors (n = 2), one frozen and one fresh, placed at the Australian Facility ...

Abstract Forensic investigations of single and mass graves often use surface anomalies, including changes to soil and vegetation conditions, to identify potential grave locations. Though numerous resources describe surface anomalies in grave detection, few studies formally investigate the rate at which the surface anomalies return to a natural state; hence, the period the grave is detectable to observers. Understanding these processes can provide guidance as to when ground searches will be an e...