Museums' Role: Pollen and Forensic Science

Warny, Sophie

doi:10.1126/science.339.6124.1149-a

Cited by 9 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 3 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Second, it requires that the collected pollen be diagnostic not just of a particular biome (e.g., temperate forest) but of a more specific region, the odds of which improve with the number of pollen taxa encountered [ 11 ]. Third, it requires that we can accurately identify the pollen from all over the world or at least all over the region from which an object or body has potentially originated, which requires comprehensive collections of pollen [ 12 ] and the expertise necessary to match pollen to those collections [ 13 ]. In practice, this has meant that, while the use of palynological approaches in forensics and archaeology has become more common [ 4 ], it has depended heavily on expert identification of the pollen of individual plant species and knowledge about the distribution of those species.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fungi Identify the Geographic Origin of Dust Samples

et al. 2015

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

There is a long history of archaeologists and forensic scientists using pollen found in a dust sample to identify its geographic origin or history. Such palynological approaches have important limitations as they require time-consuming identification of pollen grains, a priori knowledge of plant species distributions, and a sufficient diversity of pollen types to permit spatial or temporal identification. We demonstrate an alternative approach based on DNA sequencing analyses of the fungal diversity found in dust samples. Using nearly 1,000 dust samples collected from across the continental U.S., our analyses identify up to 40,000 fungal taxa from these samples, many of which exhibit a high degree of geographic endemism. We develop a statistical learning algorithm via discriminant analysis that exploits this geographic endemicity in the fungal diversity to correctly identify samples to within a few hundred kilometers of their geographic origin with high probability. In addition, our statistical approach provides a measure of certainty for each prediction, in contrast with current palynology methods that are almost always based on expert opinion and devoid of statistical inference. Fungal taxa found in dust samples can therefore be used to identify the origin of that dust and, more importantly, we can quantify our degree of certainty that a sample originated in a particular place. This work opens up a new approach to forensic biology that could be used by scientists to identify the origin of dust or soil samples found on objects, clothing, or archaeological artifacts.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fungi Identify the Geographic Origin of Dust Samples

et al. 2015

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Various characteristics of plant organs and pollen contribute to biological diversity (Hwang and Masters, 2013) and data on their variability lay groundwork for the solution of many biological problems related to taxonomy, microevolutionary processes, hybridization, and gene pool protection (Polyakova and Gataulina, 2008;Warny, 2013). Pollen analysis or the study of pollen grain morphology (i.e., size, exine pattern, fertility, and viability) is a research method for measuring the reproductive potential of plants (Goodman et al, 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pollen Morphology of Broadleaf Trees Growing in Different Health Conditions in the City of Aktobe

Utarbayeva

Aipeisova²,

Maui

et al. 2021

Environ. Control Biol.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The purpose of this work is to comparatively assess pollen viability of five plant species growing in different areas of the city of Aktobe, Kazakhstan (N 50Њ18¢, W 57Њ10¢). Pollen viability was assessed through iodine staining on the samples of pollen grains harvested between April and June 2017 from 100 plants of 5 species growing in the industrial zones, parks, and along highways: Ulmus laevis Pall., Ulmus pinnato-ramosa Dieck., Acer negundo L., Syringa vulgaris L., Populus tremula L. The minimum percentage of fertile pollen grains that was found in Ulmus laevis species has been detected in samples from the industrial zones, up to 68%. For Ulmus pinnato-ramosa, the minimum proportion of fertile pollen grains was 30%. For Acer negundo and Syringa vulgaris, similar trends were obtained. All plant species except Ulmus laevis (0.42) and Populus tremula (0.37) showed no relationship between the size of pollen grains and the intensity of their color change. Among all plant species under study, two (Ulmus laevis and Populus tremula) had the potential to act as model plant species and bioindicators of urban pollution. All five plant species demonstrated the highest proportion of defective pollen grains in the industrial zones, up 98%.

show abstract

“…of a suspect, it is possible that analysis of that material can help to indicate that the owner was present at a crime scene (e.g. Popp, 1939;Horrocks et al, 1998;Mildenhall, 2006;Wiltshire, 2009Wiltshire, , 2016Warny, 2013;Babcock and Warny, 2014;Wiltshire et al, , 2015Williams et al, 2017;Laurence and Bryant, 2019;Warny et al, 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The forensic utility of reworked geological materials in soil

Riding

2021

Forensic Science International

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Museums' Role: Pollen and Forensic Science

Cited by 9 publications

References 3 publications

Fungi Identify the Geographic Origin of Dust Samples

Fungi Identify the Geographic Origin of Dust Samples

Pollen Morphology of Broadleaf Trees Growing in Different Health Conditions in the City of Aktobe

The forensic utility of reworked geological materials in soil

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About