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Questions Hair Analysis

This document discusses hair analysis for criminal investigations. It addresses distinguishing human hair from animal hair based on physical characteristics like color, medulla shape, cuticle scale, and medullary index. Hair is considered circumstantial evidence rather than positive identification like fingerprints because it requires reasoning to link it to a person, but it can still provide important corroborating evidence by determining species, location on the body, drug use, etc. The document also compares differences in human versus animal hair, phases of human hair growth, and examples of how hair analysis learning could be applied to criminal cases like determining the cause of damage from cutting or tools.

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Nurul Haziqah
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891 views2 pages

Questions Hair Analysis

This document discusses hair analysis for criminal investigations. It addresses distinguishing human hair from animal hair based on physical characteristics like color, medulla shape, cuticle scale, and medullary index. Hair is considered circumstantial evidence rather than positive identification like fingerprints because it requires reasoning to link it to a person, but it can still provide important corroborating evidence by determining species, location on the body, drug use, etc. The document also compares differences in human versus animal hair, phases of human hair growth, and examples of how hair analysis learning could be applied to criminal cases like determining the cause of damage from cutting or tools.

Uploaded by

Nurul Haziqah
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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QUESTIONS

1. What physical characteristics of the hair did you use to help distinguish one type
from another? Support with specific examples from your observations.
- The physical characteristics of the hair are including the colour which is the
pigment, shape of medulla, cutical scale and the medullary index.
- For example, the medullary index of humans hair is less than 0.3 while for the
animals hair is greater than 0.5.
2. Explain why hair is considered circumstantial evidence instead of a positive means
of identification as fingerprints are.
- Circumstantial evidence is any evidence that requires some reasoning or inference
in order to prove a fact. This type of evidence is sometimes referred to as indirect
evidence and it may have more than one explanation or lead to more than anoe
conclusion.
- Hair is encountered as physical evidence in a wide variety of crimes. The important
of hair as physical evidence cannot be underemphasized. Its removal from the body
often denotes physical contact between a victim and perpetrator.
- When hair is properly collected at the crime scene and submitted to the laboratory
along with enough standard samples, it can provide strong corroborative evidence
for placing an individual at a crime site because of the DNA obtained at the follicle
of the hair.

3. Even though considered circumstantial, why is hair considered important


evidence? Give examples to support your point.
- Human hair is one of the most frequently found pieces of evidence at the scene of
a violent crime. It can provide a link between the criminal and the crime.
- From hair, one can determine:
If the source is human or animal
Race (some cases)
Origin of the location on the sources body
Whether the hair was forcibly removed
If the hair has been treated with chemicals
If drugs have been ingested
4. What differences did you find between human and animal hairs?
- Human hairs are generally consistent in color and pigmentation throughout the
length of the hair shaft, whereas animal hairs may exhibit radical color changes in
a short distance, called banding.
- For the cuticle, human hair is imbricate (flattened) while animal hair varies by
species, but can be spinuous or coronal.

5. What have you learned about hair that you did not know before? Be specific.
- It is about the phases of hair growth. Human head hair grows in three development
stages which are anagen, catagen and telogen. The shape and size of the hair root
is determined by the growth phase in which the hair is happen to be. Hair is known
to grow at a rate of approximately one centimeter (1 cm) per month.
- Anagen is astage of hair is actively growing. Catagen is stage of hair is not growing
or called a resting phase while telogen is the stage where the follicle id getting ready
to push the hair out.
- The hair at the telogen phase does not contain any DNA compared to anagen and
catagen phase which have DNA that obtained from the follicle of the hair.

6. How can you apply what you have learned from this investigation to a criminal
investigation? Be specific and support your answers with clear examples.
- In this investigation, we can know that the different cut and damages hair will give
the different tip. From that we can know the real cause of the damage hair when
observed the tip of the hair under microscope. For example the hair were damaged
by scissor cut, razor blade cut, broken hair, burned hair or else.
- Other than that, by measured the medullary index which the diameter of medulla
will divide by the diameter of the hair, we can differentiate the hair between animal
hair and human hair. Medullary index for human hair is generally less than 1/3
while for animal hair it is usually greater than 1/2.

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