NCJ Number
229681
Journal
Journal of Forensic Sciences Volume: 55 Issue: 1 Dated: January 2010 Pages: 50-57
Date Published
January 2010
Length
8 pages
Annotation
This study describes the development of what is effectively a human scent barcode consisting of the relative ratios of an individual's "primary odor" compound utilized to determine a reproducible and individualizing profile which can be stored in a searchable database for a proof of concept of human scent as a biometric measure.
Abstract
Human scent evidence is utilized as an investigative tool through canine scent discrimination based on the premise that human scent is an individualizing characteristic. Triplicate hand odor samples were evaluated from 10 subjects utilizing solid phase micro-extraction gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (SPME-GC/MS) and compared via Spearman Rank Correlations. Narrowing the compounds considered for each subject to only those common in all three samples, or a subject's "primary odor constituents," produced a greater degree of both individualization and discrimination; at both correlation thresholds of 0.9 and 0.8, the individuals were correctly discriminated and identified in 99.54 percent of the cases. 5 tables, 1 figures, and 52 references (Published abstract)