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Separating forensic, WWII, and archaeological human skeletal remains using ATR-FTIR spectra

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Abstract

ATR-FTIR spectroscopy is a fast and accessible, minimally or non-destructive technique which provides information on physiochemical characteristics of analyzed materials. In forensic and archaeological sciences, it is commonly used for answering numerous questions, including the archaeological or forensic context of the human skeletal remains. In this research, the accuracy of ATR-FTIR-obtained spectra for separation between forensic, WWII, and archaeological human skeletal remains was investigated. Building from the previously proposed methodological procedures, various ratio-based and whole spectra separation procedures were applied, carefully analyzed, and evaluated. Results showed that employing whole spectral domains works best for the separation of archaeological, WWII, and forensic samples, even with samples of highly variable origin. Principal component analysis (PCA) further highlighted the necessity of acknowledging all the major components in the remains: amides, phosphates, and carbonates for the separation. Most influential proved to be amide I, namely its secondary structure, which presented well-preserved and organized collagen structure in forensic and WWII samples, while highly degraded in archaeological samples. Using the whole spectral domain for separation between samples from different contexts proved to be fast and simple, with no manipulation beyond baseline correction and normalization of spectra necessary. However, a dataset with samples of known origin is required for the learning model and predictions. A less accurate alternative is separation based on combining ratios of peaks correlating to organics and minerals in the bone, which eliminated overlapping and managed to classify the majority of the samples correctly as archaeological, WWII, or forensic.

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Notes

  1. In Slovenia, the victims from the WWII mass graves are under the jurisdiction of The Commission on Concealed Mass Graves and are processed by either National Forensic Institute or Institute of Forensic Medicine.

  2. For a review on the peak assignment see for example Figueiredo et al. 2010 and Lopes et al. 2018.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Dr. Jože Grdadolnik from the National Institute of Chemistry for making the use Bruker Vertex 80 spectrometer possible, and to the Governmental Commission on Concealed Mass Graves of the Republic of Slovenia for their support in excavations of Second World War victims. Furthermore, we would like to thank the head of the Centre for Preventive Archaeology of the Institute for the protection of Cultural Heritage of Slovenia (IPCHS CPA) Barbara Nadbath for recognizing this research as important for the development of operational procedures in the heritage protection field. Our thanks also goes to Dr. Maja Janežič, Monika Arh, Marija Lubšina Tušek, Miha Murko, Evgen Lazar (all IPCHS CPA), and Matjaž Novšak (Arhej d. o. o.) for all the information about the archaeological remains form the archives, as well as Dr. Timotej Knific (National Museum of Slovenia) and Vesna Koprivnik (Regional Museum of Maribor) for including the archaeological human remains from their museums into our study.

Funding

This study was partially financially supported by the Slovenian Research Agency (project “Determination of the most appropriate skeletal elements for molecular genetic identification of aged human remains” (J3-8214)).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, Zavetiška 5, 1000, Ljubljana, Slovenia

    Tamara Leskovar & Matija Črešnar

  2. Institute of Forensic Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ljubljana, Korytkova 2, 1000, Ljubljana, Slovenia

    Irena Zupanič Pajnič

  3. National Institute of Chemistry, Hajdrihova 19, 1001, Ljubljana, Slovenia

    Ivan Jerman

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Correspondence to Tamara Leskovar.

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Leskovar, T., Zupanič Pajnič, I., Jerman, I. et al. Separating forensic, WWII, and archaeological human skeletal remains using ATR-FTIR spectra. Int J Legal Med 134, 811–821 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00414-019-02079-0

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