LIsa Black
Cape Coral, FL
Female, 49
I spent the five happiest years of my life in a morgue. As a forensic scientist in the Cleveland coroner’s office I analyzed gunshot residue on hands and clothing, hairs, fibers, paint, glass, DNA, blood and many other forms of trace evidence, as well as crime scenes. Now I'm a certified latent print examiner and CSI for a police department in Florida. I also write a series of forensic suspense novels, turning the day job into fiction. My books have been translated into six languages.
Yes, they are different substances.
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Wow I am sorry I somehow didn't answer this question!! In my experience we do a presumptive test for both and then send to DNA testing because they will confirm the presence of DNA in the quantitative step. We do have the OBTI test for human blood but there's no reason to do it u less we're in a huge hurry to confirm human blood.
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Send me your email address. If you don't want to post it here you can email me through my website: www.lisa-black@live.com.
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I would suggest biology or chemistry, but that was what everyone took when I started out, so I may be behind the times. Your best bet is to call the crime labs you might wish to work at and ask what they prefer. Also check employment postings on the forensic organizations websites, such as IAI and AAFS. That's the only way to be more certain what they actually want.
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Wouldn't that get the whole crime scene wet? And wouldn't a layer of hair indicate that the hair was a diversion, since obviously no one would normally shed that much hair while committing a crime. It scattering hair wouldn't affect fingerprints or touch DNA, which crime scene techs would be looking for more than hair anyway. Most labs don't even analyze hair any more. Also, I should clarify, hair cells don't have nuclear DNA. DNA in hair usually comes from the skin cells that hold the hair in your scalp and cling to the root. So if you're using cut hair there would not be any nuclear DNA to obtain. Mitochondrial DNA is a different type of DNA present in your cells' mitochondria. It will be the same throughout your body but is passed down unchanged from mother to child so it will be identical with your mother, your mother's siblings (assuming the same grandmother), your siblings from the same mother, your first cousins from your maternal aunts, etc. But very very few labs test mitochondrial DNA so it's unlikely it would be tested from your crime scene unless it was extremely high-profile and they had no other evidence to use. And then they'd have to have a suspect to compare it to or it would be useless. (CODIS, the national DNA database, is nuclear DNA.)
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I doubt I can help you but I'll try to get the pic.
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Sure, send me your email address. If you don't want to post it here you can email me through my website: www.lisa-black@live.com.
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