Forensic Expert Says Bigfoot Is Real

Now, Bigfoot advocates are increasingly turning to forensic evidence to prove the existence of the giant creature.

Investigator Jimmy Chilcutt of the Conroe Police Department in Texas, who specializes in finger- and footprints, has analyzed the more than 150 casts of Bigfoot prints that Meldrum, the Idaho State professor, keeps in a laboratory.

Chilcutt says one footprint found in 1987 in Walla Walla in Washington State has convinced him that Bigfoot is real.

"The ridge flow pattern and the texture was completely different from anything I've ever seen," he said. "It certainly wasn't human, and of no known primate that I've examined. The print ridges flowed lengthwise along the foot, unlike human prints, which flow across. The texture of the ridges was about twice the thickness of a human, which indicated that this animal has a real thick skin."

Meldrum, meanwhile, says a 400-pound (180-kilogram) block of plaster known as the Skookum Cast provides further evidence of Bigfoot's existence. The cast was made in September 2000 from an impression of a large animal that had apparently lain down on its side to retrieve some fruit next to a mud hole in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in Washington State.

Meldrum says the cast contains recognizable impressions of a forearm, a thigh, buttocks, an Achilles tendon and heel. "It's 40 to 50 percent bigger than a normal human," he said. "The anatomy doesn't jive with any known animal."

A few academics believe Meldrum could be right.

Renowned chimpanzee researcher Jane Goodall last year surprised an interviewer from National Public Radio when she said she was sure that large, undiscovered primates, such as the Yeti or Sasquatch, exist.


FOR MORE READ: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/10/1023_031023_bigfoot_2.html

Chemical In Henna Useful In New Fingerprinting Techniques

Henna, used to draw attractive designs on palms and in hair dyes, may become the latest tool in the fight against crime.

Curtin University of Technology researchers are developing new fingerprinting technologies using lawsone, a naturally occurring substance found in henna.



Simon Lewis, Associate Professor of Forensic Chemistry, said the new methods being tested had the potential to be an important complementary method to those currently used in fingerprint detection.

According to Curtin PhD student Renee Jelly, lawsone’s properties made it a very useful tool for law enforcement.

“Lawsone is the compound that gives henna its characteristic property for dying hair and skin a reddish brown colour,” she said.

“We have discovered that it reacts with the amino acids in invisible fingerprints on paper, which turn a purple-brown colour when treated with lawsone.

“These coloured fingerprints are also luminescent under a forensic light source.”

Miss Jelly’s thesis, Natural Products as Novel Reagents for the Development of Latent Fingermarks on Porous Surfaces, involves investigating a number of alternative materials to use in hunting for fingerprints on paper.

“Paper-based evidence, such as documents, wrapping material and containers, are frequently encountered in criminal investigations,” she said.

“The most widely used methods for detecting invisible fingerprints on these surfaces rely upon the detection of the amino acids present in natural skin secretions.

“Fingerprints formed in this way can be extremely long lived, with impressions in excess of 20 years of age being developed with amino acid sensitive treatments.

Source: medindia.net

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Forensic Scientists Improve DNA Analysis With Mummy-inspired Bone-baking

ScienceDaily () -- Forensic scientists analyzing bones found in the Gobi desert discovered that the DNA within them could be surprisingly easily extracted. In an experiment designed to mimic the conditions that affected those bones, baking a particularly difficult sample made the DNA much more easily extracted, probably because it makes it easier to break open more cells and expose more of the DNA molecules.

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