Results of an investigation into unheated bone mineral and behavior of bone upon heating for 12 animal species (including human) demonstrate that b-HAP characteristics, quantitatively measured using X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis, exhibit significant inter-species variation. Human bone was found to be significantly different to all other species in terms of b-HAP lattice parameter values from unheated and heated bone and in terms of recrystallization behavior of b-HAP upon heating bone to 600 degrees C. The amounts of b-HAP thermal decomposition products were also significantly different for human bone heated to 1400 degrees C compared to those obtained for most other species. Therefore, there is potential for the development of an XRD-based method of species identification, particularly one that distinguishes human from non-human bone. (Published Abstract)