Forensics and Crime

The forensic investigation of crime includes the use of the scientific method to study past events for legal purposes, often to reconstruct unknown events associated with a crime scene. Over time, a highly specialized set of applied scientific sub-specialties have evolved for use in the forensic investigation of crimes, including biology, latent fingerprints, ballistics, trace evidence, document analyses, anthropology, and toxicology. While forensic disciplines are used to inform the investigation of different types of crimes, most of these disciplines are organized within crime laboratories that are utilized by public institutions for legal purposes. In this entry, the major forensic disciplines will be reviewed, the role of the crime lab in forensic investigations will be discussed, and current challenges and the future directions of forensic science will be reviewed.