Advanced spectroscopic techniques for body fluid identification: complementing conventional methods

Abstract Background Body fluids (BFs) are highly important in forensically relevant scenarios. Historically, conventional techniques have been used for their identification and detection purposes. However, there is no conventional technology available that can detect a mixture of body fluids in one go. Main body There is a need for an advanced confirmatory technique that can reliably detect all types of body fluids even in trace forms, whether in pure form or in mixture form. The discussed spectroscopic techniques include raman spectroscopy, fourier transform infrared (FTIR), mass spectroscopy (MS), and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR). Conclusions These reviewed techniques have proven to be advanced, confirmatory, mostly non-destructive, sensitive, reliable, and reproducible techniques in body fluid identification when combined with advanced statistical analysis and available reference databases. 1 H NMR spectroscopy can be an emerging versatile technique with wide-ranging forensic applications. The progressive research related to these advanced techniques can revolutionize the field of forensics.