A Career in Forensic Science

Some time ago, in many parts of the world, when mentioning "forensic science", most imagined an old man with a knife slicing into pieces the body of a dead man, to know the causes of death. But the reality is that the concept of "Forensic science" is much broader.

The definition of forensics is the application of scientific practices within the legal process. What does this mean? Basically, that forensic science is a subset of Science that the law used to catch a criminal, either physics, chemistry, mathematics, and many more. The work of forensic investigators is too long ... passes from the collection of evidence, and the same process to the extraction of DNA samples, extensive discussions, the creation of theories about what happened, comparison of fibers, striations on a bullet, and several tasks.

This science saw countless advances throughout history. Previously, for example, when not known the existence of DNA, for sure things were more complicated and less accurate. But today, with the discovery of it, rather shortened the distance between the law and criminals, making possible the comparison between the DNA found in blood, saliva or semen at the crime scene, and the sample taken from the suspects.

But there is a problem ... why criminals become ever more meticulous, and more difficult to grasp?

Some believe that television shows about forensic science are used to enliven potential criminals, reminding them that they can shave their heads to leave no hair, or wear gloves to not leave fingerprints, or perhaps burning all his clothes after committing the crime, indeed, to avoid possible future comparisons.

The truth is that nobody can know for sure if the television programs and documentaries about forensic science are the reason that criminals are becoming more astute, but the evidence is pointing toward it.

The reality is that if criminals are becoming more astute, criminals must evolve too ... with the help of science, and great power of observation ... you could be the next star researcher .... Or not?

Forensic Entomology is an application of entomological science (the study of insects and other arthropods) to all aspects that may be related to the legal field. In these respects one of the most important is related to the establishment of the date or time of death in cases of death of forensic interest. There are, however, many other applied aspects, such as issuing valuations of fauna of stored products, biomedical reports, ...

This requires a knowledge of the fauna involved in each case and the development of their life cycles. Therefore, this laboratory identified the specimens obtained in each case and tries to establish the circumstances that allowed its presence in the sample under study.

The first written record of a case decided by forensic entomology dates back to the thirteenth century in a manual of Chinese Legal Medicine regarding a homicide case that appeared in a farmer beheaded by a sickle.

To solve the case made all the farmers of the area that could be related to the dead, deposit their sickles on the ground outdoors, noting that only one of them flies came and perched on its leaf, which led to the conclusion that the owner of the sickle was to be the murderer, because the flies were attracted by the remnants of blood that had been attached to the 'weapon' of the crime.