Centre of Applied Research Technology

Fingermarks beyond the source

what their composition may reveal about the donor

Other

fingerprints are a commonly exploited type of evidence and can be crucial in a criminal investigation. The process of individualization or exclusion of a donor relies on the comparison of ridge detail characteristics between a fingermark, found at a crime scene, and reference fingerprints, collected under controlled conditions (either or not stored in a database). Although this process has been successfully used for over a century, fingermarks found at a crime scene are of limited value for a criminal trial if the corresponding reference fingerprint is not available, or the found fingermark is of poor quality. Fingerprints consist of donor secretion, mainly eccrine and sebaceous, of which the exact composition is likely influenced by many (both endogenous and exogenous) factors, including donor traits, habits and activities. Analysis of the chemical composition could thus potentially lead to the retrieval of donor information from those fingerprints that yielded no information in the traditional comparison process. The main aim of this dissertation was to determine what donor information can reliably and validly be derived from the chemical analysis of the fingerprint composition, in order to be used in forensic investigations...

Reference van Helmond, W. (2020). Fingermarks beyond the source: what their composition may reveal about the donor. [Research HvA, graduation external, TU Delft]. https://doi.org/10.4233/uuid:2e0c5ecb-b049-45a6-8175-6b6a47101dc1
12 November 2020

Publication date

Nov 2020

Author(s)

W. van Helmond
J.H. van Esch
Ernst J.R. Sudhölter
M. de Puit

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