NEW DIMENSIONS IN FORENSIC PROFILING: IMAGING BURNED HUMAN BONES AT IMAT

Neutron imaging at IMAT will be applied to the study of burned human skeletal remains, for assessing heat-induced changes associated to alterations in bone´s microcrystallinity. This work follows successful experiments on MAPS, TOSCA and GEM which were the first studies on human burned bones by neutron techniques and allowed us to identify spectral biomarkers of heat-elicited alterations [1-7]. Combined spectroscopic (including FTIR and Raman), diffraction and imaging methods are expected to provide an improved understanding of the variations undergone by bone upon burning. A quantitative relationship between these data, dimensional variations and burning conditions is sought, to relate burned to pre-burned parameters. This is an innovative way of tackling heat-induced changes in human bone, with a high impact in forensic profiling as well as in bioarchaeological investigation.