November 18, 2014
Research facility will help solve murder investigations
Australian first research facility to assist police with missing persons and homicide investigations.
Leading forensic entomologist Associate Professor James Wallman will be a key contributor to the facility.
A unique Australian research facility on the outskirts of Sydney will improve understanding of how human remains decompose, and help police with missing persons and homicide investigations.
The multidisciplinary facility for taphonomic experimental research, which is being established by the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS) in collaboration with several partners, including UOW, will be the first in the Southern Hemisphere to use donated human cadavers to study the processes of decomposition.
Taphonomy is the study of organic remains from the time of death to the time of discovery.
Headed by world-leading UTS forensic scientist Professor Shari Forbes, the research will be conducted in collaboration with police and forensic services, ensuring data generated at the facility is applicable to human death investigations.
The facility has council approval and now has been awarded a $430,000 Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment and Facilities (LIEF) grant by the Australian Research Council (ARC).
The ARC grant will support the establishment of the facility early next year on land owned by UTS. The facility will be surrounded by a high-security fence, monitored by CCTV cameras and invisible to passing traffic or surrounding properties.
Leading forensic entomologist Associate Professor James Wallman, from UOW's Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health, will be a key contributor to the facility. He said the research carried out there would improve our techniques for search and recovery of victims and for estimating time since death.
“Although assessing death time is a major difficulty facing forensic investigators, entomology can provide death time estimates for at least several months after death.”
"There is a critical need for this new facility because forensically important insects vary geographically, and they must therefore be studied in the Australian environment for the resultant data to be applicable to local and national police services,” Professor Wallman added.
Professor Forbes said the ethical use of donated human cadavers for scientific studies was vital for the success of human death investigations here and overseas, including neighbouring countries where Australia sent emergency response teams in times of disaster.
"The scientists and police involved in this research are confronted by death on a regular basis and understand the moral and ethical significance of working with human cadavers, just like doctors and medical students," Professor Forbes said.
"This type of research is conducted with the utmost respect for the donor and compassion for the families involved, recognising the invaluable contribution they are making to society," she said.
The facility will inform a wide range of related study, including textile and fibre degradation and how soil and geological features might provide models to locate clandestine grave sites or concealed evidence.
Further UOW involvement will come from prominent scientists Professor Richard (Bert) Roberts and Dr Gert van den Bergh, from the Centre for Archaeological Science, who plan to use the facility to study bone decomposition and the geological and chemical changes in burial sites over time.
This will assist with interpreting important archaeological and paleontological sites both nationally and overseas.
The research partners include the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine, The University of Sydney, University of Canberra, The Australian National University, The University of New England, Australian Federal Police, Victoria Police and the NSW Police Department, as well as UTS and UOW.
If research being done at such a facility helped solve even one murder or missing persons case it would have made a difference, said the executive director of Homicide Victims' Support Group (Aust) Inc., Martha Jabour.
"We strongly support the work Professor Forbes is doing because of the difference it can make to families and friends affected by the murder of a loved one," Ms Jabour said.
Media contact: Elise Pitt, Media & PR Officer, UOW, +61 2 4221 3079, +61 422 959 953 or epitt@uow.edu.au.