Forensic Project

Goal:

For this project, we were tasked to solve a murder using forensic science. Forensic science is an application of science to criminals and civil wars for investigation. In this project, my group and I used evidence from the crime scene and concluded an explanation of the suspects are that conducted the murder.

Case:

This went on April 11, 2022. It was during a picnic on chalk hill by San Marin High School. It was Carleton Comet’s celebration party that he was holding after he got out of jail with old friends. The guests of the party were Nancy Normal, Glen Glee, Theresa Terra, Sam Sophomore, and Fred Flimmer. Carlton Comet had made an unnoticed impact on all of the members of the party. The hosts sat down at a table of exquisite dishes. The clouds covered the sun, a glass dropped, and Carlton Comet groaned. When the sun revealed itself, Carlton Comet was dead with a steak knife in his back. The police were called and they came to the scene. After analyzing results from fingerprints, ink pens, threatening note, blood, pedigrees, karyotypes, and DNA, we determined that Sam Sophomore and Nancy Normal worked together to murder Carleton Comet.

Our Presentation / Evidence

Forensic Project Presentation Akio, Javi and Aiden K

Content

Punnett Square: A diagram that helps show all the possible allelic combinations of gametes in a cross of parents with genotypes in order to predict the probability of their offspring can possess certain sets of alleles.

Genotype: organism's complete set of genetic material
Phenotype: organism's characteristics that result from its genotype
Dominant: an allele that is expressed even only when inherited from one parent
Recessive: an allele that isn't expressed unless it's inherited from both parents
Codominant: A type of inheritance in which two different alleles of the same gene are expressed separately to result in different traits in an individual
Heterozygous: A gene with two different alleles
Homozygous: A gene with two of the same alleles

Fingerprinting: Fingerprinting is used to identify suspects and solve crimes. There are three main groups of fingerprints such as loops, arches, and whorls. After analyzing the fingerprints in our case, the fingerprint matched Nancy Normal's because of an arch type.

Ink Chromatography: Ink chromatography is a process that separates the colored pigments that make up the color of the pen by using chemicals. In our case, a death note was found that read "U r a dead man", and we used ink chromatography that analyzed which of the three pens that were found on the suspects at the crime scene to write the menacing note. The results that we found matched pen 2 which belonged to Nancy Normal and Sam Sophomore.

Blood Types: The 4 types of blood are type A, B, AB, and O. The blood types are codominant so if a person has heterozygous alleles, that means that they would have both A and B. During this investigation, we acquired blood from each suspect and 2 from the crime scene. We mixed the A and B antigens and if the blood was clumped then it had that antigen. Crime scene 1 had blood type O meaning that it matched with Carleton Comet and Sam Sophomore while scene 2 had blood type A which matched with Nancy Normal and Gleen Glee.

Pedigrees: A model that shows the occurrence and appearance of the phenotypes of a gene or organism and its connections to ancestors from family generations. Pedigrees can be used in criminal investigations to show family connections and our pedigree connected the suspects' families to Carelton Comet who is Thomas Sandstone.

Karyotypes: A picture of a person's chromosomes and can be used to find chromosomal disorders. During this project, we had karyotypes of each of the suspects and two from the crime scenes. Crime scene 1's karyotype matched with Carelton Comet because he has an x and two y chromosomes that represented an XYY syndrome. Crime scene 2's karyotype matched with Nancy Normal because she has an extra x chromosome which represents a Triple X syndrome.

DNA Fingerprinting: Gel electrophoresis separates each of the DNA samples into parts that are unique to each individual which creates DNA fingerprints. This type of investigation helps forensic scientists compare samples from the suspects to two samples from the crime scenes. During our investigation, we found that DNA from crime scene 1 belonged to Carelton Comet and DNA from crime scene 2 came from Nancy Normal.

Reflection

I am really proud of how this project turned out and I had a lot of fun with it. Our class got to experience many different labs and we learned what it takes to live in the forensic science world. Personally, I think I did really well as a collaborator throughout this project by formatting the presentation to explaining our pieces of evidence to my groupmates. My best strength in this project is being a critical thinker by understanding each of the suspect's family histories and connecting how Carelton Comet and Thomas Sandstone are the same person.

As a group, we needed to improve on being conscientious learners and our collaboration throughout the project. Firstly, we could've managed our time better if we put more focus and time into the project because there were some moments when we didn't understand what to do with the pieces of evidence that we collected since we were off-topic most of the time. Secondly, I feel like we all could've collaborated more equally within the group by splitting up the work and not having one person do most of the formatting or work. Overall, I had a blast executing this project with my groupmates and I learned that it takes a lot of focus to become a forensic scientist.

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