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 SOIL
ANALYSIS
in
FORENSIC
TAPHONOMY
Chemical and Biological Effects
of
Buried Human Remains

Edited by
Mark Tibbett and David O. Carter

Boca Raton London New York

CRC Press is an imprint of the

Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

69918.indb 1 2/6/08 12:19:23 PM

 CRC Press
Taylor & Francis Group
6000 Broken Sound Parkway NW, Suite 300
Boca Raton, FL 33487‑2742
© 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
CRC Press is an imprint of Taylor & Francis Group, an Informa business

No claim to original U.S. Government works

Printed in the United States of America on acid‑free paper
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

International Standard Book Number‑13: 978‑1‑4200‑6991‑4 (Hardcover)

This book contains information obtained from authentic and highly regarded sources. Reprinted
material is quoted with permission, and sources are indicated. A wide variety of references are
listed. Reasonable efforts have been made to publish reliable data and information, but the author
and the publisher cannot assume responsibility for the validity of all materials or for the conse‑
quences of their use.

Except as permitted under U.S. Copyright Law, no part of this book may be reprinted, reproduced,
transmitted, or utilized in any form by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying, microfilming, and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without written permission from the publishers.

For permission to photocopy or use material electronically from this work, please access www.
copyright.com (http://www.copyright.com/) or contact the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc. (CCC)
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Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and
are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

Library of Congress Cataloging‑in‑Publication Data

Soil analysis in forensic taphonomy : chemical and biological effects of buried

human remains / editor(s), Mark Tibbett and David O. Carter.
p. ; cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978‑1‑4200‑6991‑4 (alk. paper)
1. Forensic taphonomy. 2. Soils‑‑Analysis. 3. Soil microbiology. 4. Human
decomposition. I. Tibbett, Mark. II. Carter, David O.
[DNLM: 1. Forensic Anthropology‑‑methods. 2. Soil‑‑analysis. 3. Postmortem
Changes. 4. Soil Microbiology. W 750 S6826 2008]

RA1063.47.S65 2008
363.25‑‑dc22 2007045309

Visit the Taylor & Francis Web site at

http://www.taylorandfrancis.com
and the CRC Press Web site at
http://www.crcpress.com

69918.indb 2 2/6/08 12:19:23 PM

 For Tammy, Jasmine, Courtney and Joseph.

M.T.

For my father and mother, who encouraged curiosity and

my desire to learn. And to Mike Madison and the
Hepworth family, for showing me the importance of study.

D.O.C.

69918.indb 3 2/6/08 12:19:23 PM

69918.indb 4 2/6/08 12:19:23 PM
 Contents

Preface vii
Editors ix
Contributors xi

1 Nature, Distribution, and Origin of Soil

Materials in the Forensic Comparison of Soils 1
Robert W. Fitzpatrick

2 Cadaver Decomposition and Soil: Processes 29

David O. Carter and Mark Tibbett

3 The Role of Soil Organisms in Terrestrial

Decomposition 53
David W. Hopkins

4 Soil Fungi Associated with Graves and Latrines:

Toward a Forensic Mycology 67
Naohiko Sagara, Takashi Yamanaka,
and Mark Tibbett

5 The Role of Invertebrates in Terrestrial

Decomposition: Forensic Applications 109
Ian R. Dadour and Michelle L. Harvey

6 The Decomposition of Hair in the Buried Body

Environment 123
Andrew S. Wilson

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 vi Contents

7 The Decomposition of Materials Associated

with Buried Cadavers 153
Robert C. Janaway

8 Decomposition Chemistry in a Burial

Environment 203
Shari L. Forbes

9 Potential Determinants of Postmortem and

Postburial Interval of Buried Remains 225
Shari L. Forbes

10 Principles and Methodologies of Measuring

Microbial Activity and Biomass in Soil 247
Phil C. Brookes

11 Methods of Characterizing and Fingerprinting

Soils for Forensic Application 271
Lorna A. Dawson, Colin D. Campbell,
Stephen Hillier, and Mark J. Brewer

Index 317

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 Preface

Forensic taphonomy is an applied discipline that is coming of age. To date,

however, the major advances in the field have been captured in publications
that deal primarily with the cadaver and associated items rather than the
grave itself. This book provides, for the first time, a collection of chapters
from leading scientists in their fields that deal primarily with the burial
environment. Our focus is on the processes of decomposition in soils, the
decomposers in the soil, and the basic physiochemical composition of the
soil as it relates to forensic science and taphonomy.
The book aims to provide the reader with an up-to-date overview of
fundamental scientific principles and methods used in forensic taphonomy
from a soils-based perspective. Soils are the materials that make up most
clandestine graves but are often given scant consideration. This is a shame,
as soils can contain an enormous amount of information within them—if
you know what to look for and how to find it. The purpose of this book is to
illuminate this search for forensic information in the soils generally and at
gravesites particularly. Of particular importance here is the detritusphere,
the soil immediately around the cadaver. This soil is the most altered by the
decomposition process and can contribute to the decomposition process.
Many biological and chemical effects of buried human remains can be found
here, and the analysis of soils around a cadaver for forensic use, though in its
infancy, is progressing apace.
The terrestrial environment has been much studied as a decomposition
environment for materials of little forensic value, such as leaf litter or dead
roots. These provide the basic methods and framework for studying and
understanding decomposition of materials in soils. It is only in recent years
that this has been applied to forensic taphonomy, in which studies have been
conducted with mammalian tissues and cadavers. The burial environment
is a complex and dynamic system of interdependent chemical, physical, and
biological processes. These processes influence, and are influenced by, the
inclusion of a body and its subsequent decay. Though this book deals with
what is known in this context, much still remains to be discovered, under-
stood, and applied to forensic science.
We believe this book is timely, as soils are receiving increased attention
as physical evidence. Thus far, the twenty-first century has seen an increase
of peer-reviewed publications related to soils and forensic science of at least

vii

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 viii Preface

one third from the last decade of the twentieth century. We hope that this
book will provide a solid foundation for forensic taphonomists, anthropolo-
gists, soil scientists, entomologists, bacteriologists, and mycologists who aim
to use the processes of cadaver decomposition in terrestrial ecosystems to
solve crime.

Mark Tibbett

David O. Carter

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 Editors

Mark Tibbett, Ph.D. is a soil micro­

biologist with a long-standing interest
in decomposition processes in terrestrial
ecosystems. He has worked in many of
the world’s ecoregions including tropical,
Mediterranean, temperate, boreal, and
polar ecosystems. His interests in forensic
taphonomy arose from a research activity
in organic nutrient patch dynamics in
soils, the principles of which he has
applied to forensic science. Dr. Tibbett
is currently director of the Centre for
Land Rehabilitation at the University of
Western Australia.

David O. Carter, Ph.D. is an assistant professor of forensic science at the

University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where he teaches courses in forensic science
and coordinates the undergraduate
degree program in forensic science. Dr.
Carter earned a master of science in
forensic archaeology from Bournemouth
University, U.K. (2001) and a Ph.D. from
James Cook University, Australia (2005).
He investigates the processes associated
with cadaver decomposition in terrestrial
ecosystems with a focus on the fate of
cadaver-derived carbon, nitrogen, and
phosphorus to develop methods for the
estimation of postmortem interval and
the identification of clandestine graves.

ix

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69918.indb 10 2/6/08 12:19:24 PM
 Contributors

Mark J. Brewer Shari L. Forbes

Biomathematics and Statistics Scotland Faculty of Science
The Macaulay Institute University of Ontario Institute of
Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen Technology
United Kingdom Oshawa, Ontario

Phil C. Brookes Michelle L. Harvey

Agriculture and Environment Division School of Biological Sciences
IACR-Rothamsted Experimental Station University of Portsmouth
Harpenden, Hertfordshire Portsmouth, Hampshire
United Kingdom United Kingdom

Colin D. Campbell Stephen Hillier

Soils Group Soils Group
The Macaulay Institute The Macaulay Institute
Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen
United Kingdom United Kingdom

David O. Carter David W. Hopkins

Department of Entomology Scottish Crop Research Institute
College of Agricultural Sciences and Invergowrie
Natural Resources Dundee, Scotland
University of Nebraska-Lincoln United Kingdom
Lincoln, Nebraska
Robert C. Janaway
Ian R. Dadour Archaeological Sciences
Centre for Forensic Science School of Life Sciences
University of Western Australia University of Bradford
Crawley, Western Australia Bradford, West Yorkshire
Australia United Kingdom

Lorna A. Dawson Naohiko Sagara

Soils Group Professor Emeritus
The Macaulay Institute Kyoto University
Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen Kyoto, Japan
United Kingdom
Mark Tibbett
Robert W. Fitzpatrick Centre for Land Rehabilitation
Centre for Australian Forensic University of Western Australia
Soil Science/CSIRO Land and Water Crawley, Western Australia
Glen Osmond, South Australia Australia
Australia

xi

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 xii Contributors

Andrew S. Wilson
Archaeological Sciences
School of Life Sciences
University of Bradford
Bradford, West Yorkshire
United Kingdom

Takashi Yamanaka
Forestry and Forest Products Research
Institute
Ibaraki, Japan

69918.indb 12 2/6/08 12:19:25 PM

 Nature, Distribution,
and Origin of Soil
Materials in the
Forensic Comparison
1
of Soils
Robert W. Fitzpatrick

Contents
1.1 Introduction................................................................................................... 1
1.2 Nature of Soils Relevant to Forensic Soil Science and Human
Decomposition Processes............................................................................. 3
1.3 Brief History of Forensic Soil Science......................................................... 4
1.4 Soil Origin, Classification, and Distribution............................................. 6
1.5 Spatial Scale and Pedogenic Processes..................................................... 10
1.6 Relationship between Soil Type and Scale: Regional and Global..........11
1.7 Most Favored Techniques Used by Forensic Soil Scientists....................11
1.7.1 Theory of Making Comparisons between Soil Samples............ 12
1.7.2 Approaches and Methods for Making Comparisons
between Soil Samples..................................................................... 12
1.7.2.1 Soil Color.......................................................................... 13
1.7.2.2 Soil Consistence...............................................................14
1.7.2.3 Soil Texture...................................................................... 15
1.7.2.4 Soil Structure................................................................... 20
1.7.2.5 Segregations and Coarse Fragments............................ 20
1.8 Petrographic and Other Advanced Techniques and Instruments....... 21
1.9 Conclusions.................................................................................................. 25
References............................................................................................................... 25

1.1 Introduction

Soils mean different things to different people. Soil scientists view soils as
being made up of differently sized mineral particles (i.e., sand, silt, and clay)
and organic matter. They have complex biological, chemical, physical, and
mineralogical properties that are always changing with time. Agronomists,
farmers, and gardeners, on the other hand, see soil as a medium for growing

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  Robert W. Fitzpatrick

crops, pastures, and plants primarily in the top 50 cm of the earth’s surface.
Engineers regard soil as material to build on and excavate and are usually con-
cerned primarily with moisture conditions and the ability of soil to become
compacted to support structures. However, some people regard soil as dirt or
mud because it makes them “dirty” when they make contact with it.
What do soils do for us? Soils provide a physical and chemical setting
for gases, nutrients, and water. They also exchange heat for living organ-
isms. In fact, biological activity, diversity, and productivity depend on the
specific properties of soil. Soils also distribute surface water, causing runoff
or infiltration, storage, and deep drainage. Consequently, water and solute
flow on the earth’s surface is primarily controlled by soils. Soil acts as sinks
and filters, reducing contaminants that affect the quality of water and other
resources. It also provides many construction materials (e.g., bricks) and is
the foundation for urban and recreational facilities. In addition, soils are
usually involved in the burial of human, animal, or plant remains in cem-
eteries or special kinds of landfills. Large-scale cadaver or plant decomposi-
tion processes are typically associated with such burial facilities. According
to Dent, Forbes, and Stuart (2004) the discussion of human decomposition
in soils has been largely untreated in detail, and the fragments available are
often incomplete. The application of approaches and methods developed in
pedology now are recognized by microbiologists, archaeologists, and foren-
sic scientists as crucial to the understanding of human decomposition pro-
cesses, burial site location, and questions relating to soil taphonomy.
Pedology (from the Greek pedon = soil) is the soil science discipline
concerned primarily with understanding the variety of soils and their dis-
tribution and is most directly concerned with the key questions concern-
ing sampling, descriptions, and interpretations of soils from crime scenes.
Pedologists are primarily interested in the way the five soil forming factors
(i.e., parent material, climate, topography, organisms, and time) affect the
properties of present and past (paleopedology) soils in both its natural and
disturbed state. Soil surveyors, on the other hand, are interested in describing
and classifying soils (using different National and International Soil Classifi-
cations Systems) and then mapping them, usually on aerial photographs with
the aid of remote sensing techniques and geographic information systems
(GIS). Forensic soil scientists (or forensic geologists) are more specifically
concerned with disturbed or moved soils (usually by human activity) and
sometimes with comparing them to natural soils or by matching them with
soil databases to help locate the scene of crimes. Forensic soil scientists usu-
ally obtain soil samples from crime or polluted scenes and nearby suspected
control sites from which soil may have been transported, by vehicle, foot,
or shovel. Soil properties are diverse, and this diversity may actually enable
forensic soil scientists to use soils as evidence with more certainty in crimi-
nal and environmental investigations.

69918.indb 2 2/6/08 12:19:25 PM

 Forensic Comparison of Soils 

Identification of soil differences by using various soil attributes is the first

step for using soil information to help police and environmental investigators
at crime scenes (i.e., including exhumations) and polluted sites, respectively.
Unfortunately, pedologists often use quite difficult and convoluted terminol-
ogy in soil classification (taxonomy) and for producing soil maps that are
hard to understand or that will have little apparent relevance in forensic
investigations. Pedological terminology is often difficult to understand, and
a special education is needed to interpret it easily and meaningfully. A vari-
ety of unique terms is often used in soil reports and in legends to soil maps.
However, work in the field and in the laboratory carried out by pedologists
involves an assessment of a wealth of mainly soil morphological features that
can readily be interpreted in relation to soil processes and so allows soils to
be forensically compared.
This applied aspect is often obscured by preoccupation with using dif-
ferent national and international soil classification systems, especially for the
“nonpedologist,” so it is time to revisit the science of pedology and to reem-
phasize its interpretive value to forensic science. In recent years pedologists
have developed several user-friendly special-purpose classification systems,
covering for example the following variety of practical issues: (1) engineering
applications (e.g., optical fiber cable and pipe installations); (2) minesoils; (3)
soils used for viticulture and forestry; (4) saline and acid sulfate soils (links
to policy and jurisdiction); (5) topdressing materials; (6) urban planning; and
(7) mineral exploration (e.g., Fitzpatrick et al. 2003). These special-purpose
or technical classification systems all involve soil assessment criteria and
recommendations for soil management practices to end users. This chapter
therefore has two principal objectives:

1. To review some established concepts and standard terminologies used

in pedology that have practical relevance to forensic science and to in-
soil human decomposition processes
2. To provide a brief example of the use of some pedological and related
mineralogical methods in the forensic comparison of soils

1.2 Nature of Soils Relevant to Forensic Soil Science

and Human Decomposition Processes

In 1910 the French scientist Edmond Locard, inspired by the Adventures of

Sherlock Holmes, postulated the fundamental principle on which forensic
science and trace evidence is based, namely, “The Locard Exchange Princi-
ple” (Chisum and Turvey 2000). When two things come into contact, physi-
cal components can be exchanged. For example, the exchange can take the

69918.indb 3 2/6/08 12:19:25 PM

  Robert W. Fitzpatrick

form of soil from a location transferring to shoes of a person who walked

through a particular area. These types of transfers are referred to as primary
transfers. Once a trace material has transferred, any subsequent moves of
that material are referred to as secondary transfers. These secondary trans-
fer materials can also be significant in evaluating the nature and sources of
contact. Hence, the surface of soils can provide information linking persons
to crime scenes. The following key issues are especially important in forensic
soil examination because the diversity of soil strongly depends on topogra-
phy and climate, plus anthropogenic contaminants:

• Forensic soil examination can be complex because of the diversity and

in-homogeneity of soil samples. However, such diversity and complex-
ity enables forensic examiners to distinguish between soil samples,
which may appear to be similar.
• A major problem in forensic soil examination is the limitation in the
discrimination power of the standard and nonstandard procedures
and methods.

No standard forensic soil examination method exists. The main reasons for
this are that examination of soil is concerned with detection of both (1) natu-
rally occurring soils (e.g., minerals, organic matter, soil animals, included
rock fragments); and (2) manufactured materials in soils such as ions and
fragments from different anthropogenic environments (e.g., synthetic fertil-
izers with nitrate, phosphate, and sulfate; artifacts or objects containing lead
from glass, paint chips, asphalt, brick fragments, cinders) whose presence
may impart soil with characteristics that will make it unique to a particular
location. In addition, fine soil material may often only occur in small quanti-
ties, especially in the examination of materials from (1) the crime scene such
as in Figure 1.1a, which shows a very small amount of yellowish-gray soil
adhering to a suspects shoe, and (2) the control site such as in Figure 1.1b,
which shows the complex diversity and in homogeneity of the soil sample
from the bank of a river (Fitzpatrick, Raven, and Forrester 2007). The yellow-
ish-gray soil at the control site comprises a mixture of 95% coarse gravel and
rock fragments and only 5% clay and silt (< 50 µm fraction).

1.3 Brief History of Forensic Soil Science

On a Prussian railroad in April 1856, a barrel that contained silver coins was
found on arrival at its destination to have been emptied and refilled with
sand. A soil scientist acquired samples of sand from stations along lines of
railway and used a light microscope to match the sand to the station from
which the sand must have come (Science and Art 1856). This is arguably the

69918.indb 4 2/6/08 12:19:25 PM

 Forensic Comparison of Soils 

Soil Morphology - All Samples

Whole Soil • Soil Munsell Colour, Structure, Texture, Consistence
• Stereo Binocular Microscopy

Mineral and Organic Composition - All Samples

Sieved Smaller • Mid IR Spectroscopy (450–8000 cm-1) Drifts
Sized Fractions Diffuse Reflectance Infrared Fourier Transform
< 100 µm Sieves Spectral Analyses
• Magnetic Susceptibility
• X-ray Powder Diffraction (XRD)

Selected Samples –Depending Upon Individual Circumstances

< 2 µm Heavy Mineral Fractionation Magnetic Fractionation

• Powder XRD, Petrographic Microscopy

• Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM)
• X-ray Fluorescence (XRF), ICP-MS, Gandolfi or Debye Scherrer XRD
• FTIR, Mass Spectrometry, NMR, Thermal Analysis (DTA, TGA, DSC)
• pH, Electrical Conductivity, Exchangeable Cations, CEC, Organic Carbon, Charcoal
• Synchrotron Analysis, Others

Figure 1.1 A systematic approach to discriminate soils for forensic soil exami-
nations using soil morphology (e.g., thickness, color, consistency, texture, struc-
ture), organic matter, mineralogy, geochemistry (e.g., spectroscopy, magnetic
susceptibility analyses), and wet chemical techniques (x-ray diffraction, XRD;
inductively coupled plasma spectroscopy mass spectroscopy, ICP-MS; Fourier
transform infrared spectroscopy, FTIR; nuclear magnetic resonance, NMR; dif-
ferential thermal analysis, DTA; thermogravimetric analysis, TGA; differential
scanning calorimetry, DSC; cation exchange capacity, CEC. (From Fitzpatrick,
R. W., Raven, M., and McLaughlin, M. J., in R. W. Fitzpatrick (ed.), Proceedings
of the First International Workshop on Criminal and Environmental Forensics,
http://www.clw.csiro.au/cafss/, May 2006. With permission.)

very first documented case where a forensic comparison of soils was used to
help police solve a crime.
Then in 1887 Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Doyle 1981, p. 22) published sev-
eral fictional cases involving Sherlock Holmes such as “A Study in Scarlet” in
Beeton’s Christmas Annual of London, where Holmes can “tell at a glance dif-
ferent soils from each other … has shown me splashes upon his trousers, and
told me by their color and consistence in what part of London he had received
them.” In 1891 in “The Five Orange Pips,” Holmes observed, “chalk-rich soil”

69918.indb 5 2/6/08 12:19:26 PM

  Robert W. Fitzpatrick

on boots. This clearly indicates that Conan Doyle (Doyle 1981, p. 217) was
well aware of the key soil morphological properties (e.g., color and consis-
tence) and soil mineralogy (e.g., chalk) in forensic soil comparisons. For the
first time, as stated in Murray and Tedrow (1975), forensic scientist George
Popp successfully examined soil collected from clothing associated with
the murder of a seamstress named Eva Disch. Several recent reviews cover-
ing mainly “forensic geology” have been compiled by Ruffell and McKinley
(2004) and Murray (2004). The issue of human decomposition processes in
soils and the need to take into account the knowledge of soil environmental
factors have been reviewed by several researchers (e.g., Dent et al. 2004; Gar-
rison 2003; Spennemann and Franke 1995).
Forensic soil science is a relatively new activity that is strongly method
oriented because it is mostly a technique-driven activity in the multidisci-
plinary areas of pedology, geochemistry, mineralogy, molecular biology, geo-
physics, archaeology, and forensic science. Consequently, it does not have
an overabundance of past practitioners such as in the older disciplines like
physics and chemistry.

1.4 Soil Origin, Classification, and Distribution

Pedology has two broad purposes: (1) to describe and classify; and (2) to inter-
pret soil differences with respect to their management or use requirements.
An appropriate definition of pedology is the area of earth science responsible
for the quantification of factors and processes associated with soil forma-
tion (Wilding 1994). This includes the analysis of quality, distribution, and
spatial variability of soils from micro- to megascopic scales (Wilding 1994).
This definition introduces the phrase “extent, distribution, spatial variabil-
ity, and interpretation” in a general way. It is fair to presume, though, that
extent, distribution, spatial variability, and interpretation, for the pedologist,
includes primarily the descriptive aspects of the science—the field and labo-
ratory descriptions of soil attributes such as presence and degree of develop-
ment of particular soil features (e.g., soil color, mottling) and the interpretive
aspects of those attributes (e.g., soil in relation to drainage class or wetness).
This description and its interpretation can then be explained in relation to
the forensic comparison of soils. In addressing the questions, “What is the
soil like?” and “Where does it come from?” (i.e., provenance determination),
we are involved in studies relating to characterizing and locating the sources
of soils to make forensic comparisons.
The sophistication and effectiveness of soil classification reflects the level
of scientific maturity and an understanding of the particular area of study
(Simonson 1959). A major aim of classification is to usefully summarize the
natural variability of forms the entity takes and to enhance communication

69918.indb 6 2/6/08 12:19:27 PM

 Forensic Comparison of Soils 

about that entity. However, soil classification may stimulate or may discour-
age scientists with an interest in soils.
If a classification system proves to be relevant and user friendly, it stimu-
lates and encourages further work because it is recognized for its inherent
capacity to create order and to enhance the useful understanding of soils (e.g.,
USDA 2003). This approach has provided numerous international soil scien-
tists with valuable conceptual understanding of soils in terms of textural dif-
ferentiation of profiles, the relative development of diagnostic horizons (e.g.,
gypsic, calcic, natric, argillic, oxic), subsoil color, and mottle differences.
Many of the concepts in soil classification also provided effective pedotrans-
fer functionality, particularly in terms of soil water attributes (e.g., Bouma
1989). If a soil classification is not useful it hinders transfer of information—
often because of the lack of distinct separation between classes, many soils
were inconsistently classified and distinguished, leading to conceptual con-
fusion and pointless argument of subtle differences. For example, many soil
classification systems are significantly biased toward agricultural soils, the
subject of study for most soil scientists. Consequently, many soils found in
nonagricultural environments are not suitably categorized because they do
not match the central classification concepts (Fitzpatrick et al. 2003).
Soil classification systems are important tools within the context of the
forensic comparison of soils. They are our attempts to bring conceptual order
into the complex world of soils and to allow knowledge gained in one loca-
tion to be used in another, given that we are transferring that knowledge to
similar soil conditions with similar properties. The great variety of soils and
climates makes classification a major task even if soils were changing. To
appreciate the scale of the task we have to recognize that: soils are chang-
ing (e.g., due to erosion, salinization, disturbance, and oxidation of acid sul-
fate soils), their evolutionary history is only partially understood, and they
are used for a range of purposes, all with unique requirements in relation to
soil function and land use. The demands on soil classification are therefore
so diverse that they cannot be satisfied by a single system at any point in
time or for any part of the world. Changes in classification will be made with
advances in data collection, storage, and processing, but their value depends
on how easily class groups can be interpreted in relation to soil functions and
processes. A sound basis for interpreting soils and their use in forensic soil
comparisons resides in an improved understanding of soil processes and the
interpretation of these from soil morphology in soil landscapes.
Soil formation, or pedogenesis, is a major activity for pedologists. The
origins of soil attributes, distinctive horizons, and profiles must be under-
stood to develop conceptual models for soil evolution over both long and
short time periods (e.g., Smeck, Runge, and MacKintosh 1983). Such models
have intuitive, predictive power in the forensic comparison of soils.

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