Bird migrations are likely to get longer according to the first ever study of the potential impacts of climate change on the breeding and winter ranges of migrant birds. The length of some migrations could increase by as much as 400 km. “The predicted future temperature changes and the associated changes in habitat could have serious consequences for many species”, said lead-author Nathalie Doswald of Durham University . “Our findings show that marathon migrations for some birds are set to become even longer journeys”, said Dr Stephen Willis – team leader from Durham University. “This is bad news for birds like the Common Whitethroat”. Some 500 million birds are estimated to migrate to Europe and Asia from Africa. Birds weighing as little as nine grams undertake the annual migration of thousands of miles between the two continents to find food and suitable climate. In response to worrying declines of many migratory species, BirdLife has launched the Born to Travel Campaign to protect migratory birds along the African-Eurasian flyway. “These birds face many threats during their incredible annual journeys”, said Richard Grimmett – BirdLife’s Head of Conservation.
Monday, June 8, 2009
Monday, May 18, 2009
Forensic Facial Composite Software effective In Police Investigations
This new software, EFIT-V, allows witnesses to look at a wide range of computer generated images of possible suspects and then pick the ones that best fit the characteristics of the suspect. After repeating this process many times, a very accurate picture of the suspect will have been constructed. This process of constructing a picture of the suspect is infinitely less painstaking and difficult then having a police artist ask victims or witnesses questions in concerns with the suspect's facial features. Most of the time, witnesses/victims are not able to successfully verbalize what they see the suspect as in their head. As stated by Stuart Gibson from the University of Kent, most suspects are unable to describe facial features of an individual if they have only seen them for a brief period of time, however, it is very easy to identify facial features of an individual when picking between numerous pictures. Several trial runs of this software have been conducted in the UK and have were extremely successful. At this point in time, twelve UK police agencies are using this software for everyday law enforcement. Forensic Software such as EFIT-V, will make a huge impact on police arrests over the next few years. EFIT-V will make suspect identification a more successful and manageable task for both detectives and witnesses across the world. Hopefully, within the next few years EFIT-V will be used in all law enforcement agencies around the world.
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Corrosion Leaves Fingerprints on Bullet Casings
A pioneering forensic scientist at Northamptonshire Police and the University of Leicester is being called on by US force officers to tackle a decade-old murder case.
Dr John Bond, Scientific Support Manager at Northamptonshire Police and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Leicester Forensic Research Centre, is collaborating with Bristol Police Department, Connecticut.
He is being asked to probe the murder of a well-known and respected businessman who was shot in the bedroom of his own home. Later this month a detective from Connecticut, Detective Garrie Dorman, will meet with Dr Bond at Northampton in order see if his pioneering research technique can shed new light on the crime.
Dr Bond has developed a method that enables scientists to ‘visualise fingerprints’ on metal (eg bullet casings) even after the print itself has been removed. He and colleagues conducted a study into the way fingerprints can corrode metal surfaces. The technique can enhance – after firing– a fingerprint that has been deposited on a small calibre metal cartridge case before it is fired.
Detective Dorman said: “On February 10, 1998, Louis "Pete" LaFontaine was found shot to death in his home on Stafford Avenue in Bristol, Connecticut. Mr. LaFontaine was a resident of Bristol for many years and owned operated a successful appliance repair shop on Park Street. Mr. LaFontaine was well known throughout the City of Bristol, and his murder shocked the community and devastated his friends and family. The Bristol Police have conducted an extensive investigation into the murder of Mr. LaFontaine, but despite interviewing countless individuals, analyzing forensic evidence, and executing a number of search warrants, the murder remains unsolved. Despite this, the murder is still being actively investigated by Bristol Police Detectives and the State’s Attorney’s Office.
Dr Bond has already worked with a number of US police forces on reopening ‘cold cases’ and has found latent prints on shell casings. Dr Bond said "We very much look forward to Detective Dorman's visit and hope we are able to assist his enquiry. We have found fingerprints on shell casings in a number of cases recently that are assisting police in the US and are confident that if fingerprint corrosion is present on Detective Dorman's casings we will find it."
The Force hopes to sell the process – which has been patented worldwide – to interested buyers who could run the operation on a commercial basis or manufacture units to sell on to law enforcement agencies worldwide. This could generate benefits for both organisations
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/090115092701.htm
Dr John Bond, Scientific Support Manager at Northamptonshire Police and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Leicester Forensic Research Centre, is collaborating with Bristol Police Department, Connecticut.
He is being asked to probe the murder of a well-known and respected businessman who was shot in the bedroom of his own home. Later this month a detective from Connecticut, Detective Garrie Dorman, will meet with Dr Bond at Northampton in order see if his pioneering research technique can shed new light on the crime.
Dr Bond has developed a method that enables scientists to ‘visualise fingerprints’ on metal (eg bullet casings) even after the print itself has been removed. He and colleagues conducted a study into the way fingerprints can corrode metal surfaces. The technique can enhance – after firing– a fingerprint that has been deposited on a small calibre metal cartridge case before it is fired.
Detective Dorman said: “On February 10, 1998, Louis "Pete" LaFontaine was found shot to death in his home on Stafford Avenue in Bristol, Connecticut. Mr. LaFontaine was a resident of Bristol for many years and owned operated a successful appliance repair shop on Park Street. Mr. LaFontaine was well known throughout the City of Bristol, and his murder shocked the community and devastated his friends and family. The Bristol Police have conducted an extensive investigation into the murder of Mr. LaFontaine, but despite interviewing countless individuals, analyzing forensic evidence, and executing a number of search warrants, the murder remains unsolved. Despite this, the murder is still being actively investigated by Bristol Police Detectives and the State’s Attorney’s Office.
Dr Bond has already worked with a number of US police forces on reopening ‘cold cases’ and has found latent prints on shell casings. Dr Bond said "We very much look forward to Detective Dorman's visit and hope we are able to assist his enquiry. We have found fingerprints on shell casings in a number of cases recently that are assisting police in the US and are confident that if fingerprint corrosion is present on Detective Dorman's casings we will find it."
The Force hopes to sell the process – which has been patented worldwide – to interested buyers who could run the operation on a commercial basis or manufacture units to sell on to law enforcement agencies worldwide. This could generate benefits for both organisations
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/090115092701.htm
Friday, May 15, 2009
New Update Forensic Facial Regeneration and Recognition Software
PhotoFIT and Identikit tools have been helping the police identify suspects from eye witness statements for years, today however; the computerized versions of these tools rely on reconstructing a face from half-remembered and often poorly described features.
According to Stuart Gibson of the University of Kent, Canterbury, and colleagues at the Open University, Milton Keynes, the effectiveness of this feature-based approach is fundamentally limited by the ability of the witness to recall and describe the suspect. The older version of this process requires the witness to sit with a modern day sketch artist, and give a detailed description of every feature starting with head shape and moving all the way through to such details as eye shape and positioning. This old system relies heavily on the witness’s ability to recall every feature perfectly completely from memory; here in lies the problem. Eye witness testimonies are among the most unreliable and the courts more often than not – when an arrest is made based off of a computer re-generation of the perp. is often put through the mill in terms of accuracy. However, in recent research Gibson and co-workers developed a new approach that allowed the whole face to be recreated in a much more intuitive way. The EFIT-V software developed from the team's research is now being used by a number of police services in the UK.
"Unlike traditional feature based methods, the approach described here utilizes global, whole face, facial characteristics and allows a witness to produce plausible, photo-realistic face images in an intuitive way," says Gibson and colleagues.
With EFIT-V, the operator asks the witness some very simple questions relating to the age, sex, face-shape and hairstyle of the suspect the police are hoping to identify, explains Gibson. This information is used to initializes the EFIT-V system. In the steps that follow the witness is shown a set of computer-generated faces from which they must select the face that represents the best likeness to the suspect. Variants of the selected face are then generated and these comprise a new set of images from which another selection is made.
A good likeness to the suspect can be achieved simply by repeating this process a number of times. This new approach, which effectively ‘evolves’ a facial likeness, latches on to a person's ability to instantly recognize a face when they see it again which is known to be superior to the human capability for recalling in detail a face that was only seen fleetingly, the researchers say.
The witness is not required to provide a detailed verbal description of the face, so a lengthy and potentially tiring interview can be avoided. This new process also eliminates the long and tedious process which often causes poor, even blatantly wrong choices during the description process because in order for the old images to be created a choice must be made as to each feature so if the witness could not recall their eye color, a random one would be chosen.
Gibson and colleagues point out that controlled trials supported by the UK Home Office demonstrated that the system could double the useful intelligence gained compared with conventional approaches. Twelve UK police services are now using the system successfully.
According to Stuart Gibson of the University of Kent, Canterbury, and colleagues at the Open University, Milton Keynes, the effectiveness of this feature-based approach is fundamentally limited by the ability of the witness to recall and describe the suspect. The older version of this process requires the witness to sit with a modern day sketch artist, and give a detailed description of every feature starting with head shape and moving all the way through to such details as eye shape and positioning. This old system relies heavily on the witness’s ability to recall every feature perfectly completely from memory; here in lies the problem. Eye witness testimonies are among the most unreliable and the courts more often than not – when an arrest is made based off of a computer re-generation of the perp. is often put through the mill in terms of accuracy. However, in recent research Gibson and co-workers developed a new approach that allowed the whole face to be recreated in a much more intuitive way. The EFIT-V software developed from the team's research is now being used by a number of police services in the UK.
"Unlike traditional feature based methods, the approach described here utilizes global, whole face, facial characteristics and allows a witness to produce plausible, photo-realistic face images in an intuitive way," says Gibson and colleagues.
With EFIT-V, the operator asks the witness some very simple questions relating to the age, sex, face-shape and hairstyle of the suspect the police are hoping to identify, explains Gibson. This information is used to initializes the EFIT-V system. In the steps that follow the witness is shown a set of computer-generated faces from which they must select the face that represents the best likeness to the suspect. Variants of the selected face are then generated and these comprise a new set of images from which another selection is made.
A good likeness to the suspect can be achieved simply by repeating this process a number of times. This new approach, which effectively ‘evolves’ a facial likeness, latches on to a person's ability to instantly recognize a face when they see it again which is known to be superior to the human capability for recalling in detail a face that was only seen fleetingly, the researchers say.
The witness is not required to provide a detailed verbal description of the face, so a lengthy and potentially tiring interview can be avoided. This new process also eliminates the long and tedious process which often causes poor, even blatantly wrong choices during the description process because in order for the old images to be created a choice must be made as to each feature so if the witness could not recall their eye color, a random one would be chosen.
Gibson and colleagues point out that controlled trials supported by the UK Home Office demonstrated that the system could double the useful intelligence gained compared with conventional approaches. Twelve UK police services are now using the system successfully.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Mitochondrial DNA
http://www.forensicmag.com/articles.asp?pid=271
Over the past few years, many cold cases have been re opened in the hopes of discovering new DNA ideals and advancements will help further investigation. Cold hits are made when nuclear DNA profiles of semen, blood, or saliva crime scene samples are linked to convicted felon DNA profiles that are stored in the national DNA database (CODIS).
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