Forensic botany: who?, how?, where?, when?
- Author:
- Kasprzyk I.
- Year:
- 2023
- Journal:
- Science and Justice
- Pages:
- 63: 258–275
- Url:
- https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scijus.2023.01.002
Plants are a good source of biological forensic evidence; this is due to their ubiquity, their ability to collect
reference material, and their sensitivity to environmental changes. However, in many countries, botanical evidence
is recognised as being scientifically. Botanical evidence is not mostly used for perpertration, instead it
tends to serve as circumstantial evidence. Plant materials constitute the basis, among others, for linking a suspect
or object to a crime scene or a victim, confirming or not confirming an alibi, determining the post-mortem interval,
and determining the origin of food/object. Forensic botany entails field work, knowledge of plants, understanding
ecosystem processes, and a basis understaning of geoscience. In this study, experiments with
mammal cadavers were conducted to determine the occurence of an event. The simplest criterion characterising
botanical evidence is its size. Therefore, macroremains include whole plants or their larger fragments (e.g. tree
bark, leaves, seeds, prickles, and thorns), whereas microscopic evidence includes palynomorphs (spores and
pollen grains), diatoms, and tissues. Botanical methods allow for an analysis to be repeated multiple times and
the test material is easy to collect in the field. Forensic botany can be supplemented with molecular analyses,
which, although specific and sensitive, still require validation.
Keywords: Forensic botany ; Botanical evidence ; Macroremains ; Palynomorphs.
- Id:
- 35293
- Submitter:
- zpalice
- Post_time:
- Friday, 31 March 2023 19:55