Invited lecture at Leicester

I had a great day last week - I was invited to give a lecture to the Engineering Department at Leicester University based on my Fellowship Gunshot damage to apparel fabrics and underlying tissue. I met with staff and postgraduate candidates; we're hoping we might do some collaborative research later next year :D

Wound Ballistics 2013 (WB13)

Second Wound Ballistics Symposium at Shriv. 20 August 2013. Call for papers now open :)

New SJWRI website

Got a mention on the new Sir John Walsh Research Institute website :)

Interesting use of clothing in missing persons' cases

I was very interested to see this on the BBC website this morning

Missing Persons Bureau website

Front page news ;)

Some publicity for my Fellowship :)

A wet day in Christchurch, sunny days in Atlanta

Therese and I had a great meeting at ESR with Dr M. Taylor (who is one of Therese's supervisors for her PhD) and we got to look around the Mechanical Engineering Dept. at the University of Canterbury. I stayed in Christchurch for Saturday. I was in the CHC Sept. earthquake and was keen to see how the centre of CHC is recovering post-Feb. earthquake. I was really impressed with Re:Start and the use of shipping containers for buildings.

 

On Sunday I flew to Wellington to visit Te Papa so I could see Kahu Ora. Liz and I did some of the materials analysis on four of the kakahu (cloaks) examined as part of the research behind this exhibition. An amazing exhibition.

Finally I headed to Atlanta for four days to stay with friends Ellen and Karen. I got chance to watch a practice for the chorus they are involved in, Our Song. We visited The World of Coke and tried some truly disgusting drinks from around the world, and had some great meals including catching up with other friends David and Paul.

Now I'm back home keep an eye on these pages for news about publications arising from the WCMT Fellowship. It was an amazing time. I learnt so much and met some amazing people.

Da boch chi Dunedin

See ya Dunners.

I've had a fantastic three weeks on the 'scopes and writing articles based on the research. Liz and I have submitted one article already and plan another before Christmas (bullet work) and one after (knickers work).

I'm heading to Christchurch tomorrow for a couple of days. I'm due to visit the Mechanical Engineering Dept. at the University of Canterbury and ESR.

After CHC I'm going to Wellington to Te Papa to see the kakahu (cloak) exhibition - Liz and I did some materials analysis on some of the kakahu on display.

Then, on the way home, I'm visiting friends in Atlanta for a mini (4 day) holiday.

Thanks for reading :)

Old is sometimes better

People sometime ask me why I use SEM for my work when I rarely use a magnification of greater than x200. The simple answer is improved depth of focus compared to optical microscopy. To date I've been using a JEOL FESEM for the work, however the lowest magnification Joeline will play at is x25. Sometimes we need lower magnification. For that we use the old Cambridge S360 which we can use at x5. Just to clarify Cammy is ~25 years old, whereas as Joeline is 10 years old next April. Yes, these 'machines' have character.

Cammy and Liz

Typical x5 image from Cammy

 

It's not all work - I've had a chance to visit some old haunts including St Clair:

  At the weekend it was back to the vineyard, Sunday was glorious:

Hot in the basement

The air conditioning is broken in the SEM laboratory (in the basement of the anatomy building).

However, Liz and I are making good progress with our imaging projects fuelled by morning coffee and cinnamon buns.

We've finished the knickers specimens, found some interesting seam damage due to laundering. Here's an example.

And we've started the bullet hole specimens, here's a sneak preview of part of a .357" hole in our single jersey fabric:

Today I gave an invited lecture to the Forensic Biology Group at Otago, I got chance to present Liz and Jules with Churchill coins :)

A new worst job at the vineyard

There's a new 'worst job at the vineyard'. The vineyard is owned by my friends Trevor Deaker and Mark Borrie who I'm staying with while I'm in Dunedin. Eight Ranges Wines is based in Alexandra and I've been helping them for quite a few years.

We drove up to Alex on Friday night; there are always jobs to do. This weekend we undid, flushed and re-did up the irrigation pipes and lifted wires. The new worst job is brushing the 200+ filters in the irrigation pump to remove fresh water snail eggs.

Of course there's always time to catch up with old friends; Kay and Evan Moore from Aravin and John Matheson from Drumsara.

 Kay, Evan, Mark, Trev, John at the waterfall party

We also had a visit from friends Aimee and Tony Rae and their almost two-year old son Maxwell.

Some pics from the vineyard for you to enjoy.

Tussock chasing bunnies

Kia ora koutou

It's nice to be back in Dunedin (I worked here from 2001-2009 in the Clothing and Textile Sciences department).

I'm here to do some scanning electron microscopy contributing towards two main projects: our knicker work and gunshot to fabrics.

It's been a busy four days. Liz Girvan (SEM) and I have been discussing the work, preparing specimens and today started some imaging.

I've been meeting with Jules Kieser about the gunshot project, and talking with a joint PhD candidate Jules and I have (Therese de Castro) about her research on blood spatter.

Me, Therese and Jules

 

I've also met with my old Head of Department Raechel Laing to discuss a PhD candidate who is just about to hand in her thesis (Nur Yusof) - I was a co-supervisor for this work.

I'm staying with my friends Trevor Deaker and Mark Borrie (and Tussock - woof); this weekend we're all heading off to their vineyard Eight Ranges in Alex :)

 Liz mounting specimens

 Coating the specimens

First specimens in the JOEL

Brunches and beaches

I've just had a weekend in Sydney visiting an old friend Peter who used to work at The University of Otago and was a member of the same tramping club as me.

We brunched and walked beaches; a few pics below for you to enjoy.

 Thelma and Louise cafe

 Walking in Cremorne Reserve

  View from Cremorne Reserve

 At the end of Cremorne Reserve - one of the first uses of reinforced concrete in AUS

 Peter at Palm Beach

 Barrenjoey lighthouse

 Looking back 

Cakes, old and new friends

Saturday - onwards to Melbourne. Sarah Sakaguchi (a Cranfield Masters graduate) picked me up from the airport and we went off to St Kilda for brunch, a walk and cakes!

 So many cakes, so little time

 Sarah with cakes :)

Sunday was a day of catching up with other old friends, this time two Otago grads Gemma Radford and Sarah Weller; time for brunch.

Sarah, me and Gemma at Yellow Bird

Don't want you to think the week was one long brunch ;) My visit to Melbourne hit four places in four days. Monday and Wednesday had a defence orientation at DSTO and Diggerworks respectively. At both organisations I gave presentations, presented more Churchill coins and had meetings with old and new Australian colleagues. Thanks to Horace, Bin, Sarah and Annette.

On Tuesday I visited the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine to learn about how clothing is dealt with in the mortuary and particularly how damaged clothing in handled and packaged ready for forensic scientists to examine. I was invited to give a lecture and had an opportunity to present a Churchill coin to the team :)

 The Mortuary Team

Thursday, I was out at the Textiles Department of RMIT. I've known Mac Fergusson for a few years having met him at The Textiles Institute conference in 2010. Mac has worked with AFP on textile damage projects and is also involved in the book edited by James and Jane. He is supervising a MSc candidate Libby, who we hope will come to Shrivenham to spend some time working with us on a very interesting forensics project - Libby's in the process of presenting the work at the ANZFSS this week in Hobart. I had an opportunity to present to staff and students from RMIT with some outside guests from DSTO and CSIRO. Mac and I exchanged a Churchill coin for a very nice bottle of Aussie shiraz!

Mac and I at RMIT

A highlight of my week in Melbourne was dinner with some local Churchill Fellows. Thank you SO much Ben, Shane, Janine and Lou.

 Lou, me and Janine

Finally, a few pics from Melbourne:

Hair, textile damage and a little sightseeing

Apologies for the lack of posts; I've had a laptop disaster "Hard drive failure imminent"! Anyway, I'm now at a friends place in Sydney so have chance to up date my blog :)

The rest of my time in Canberra was spent with Professor James Robertson at the University of Canberra and Dr Jane Hemmings (and Team) at Australian Federal Police. I also had chance to do a little sightseeing :)

James, Jane and I discussed a book chapter we are collaborating on.

At UoC I sat in on a first year laboratory in hair analysis taught by James, I wonder if the students realised how lucky they are to have him teaching them. I had a chance to chat with the students about their aspirations and we talked about the differences in teaching / degrees between AUS and UK. I also sat in on a lecture James gave to a mixture of forensic and law students So you think you know about forensic science - very interesting and some useful pointers for my own lecturing. I was lucky to be able to participate in an AFP training course on hair examination.

At AFP I was invited to give a lecture and I had a chance to understand how evidence is submitted for examination and the process by which textile damage is assessed.

Lecture at AFP

After the lecture I had a chance to discuss with the Textile Damage team a case of ripped knickers, the damage observed in both the actual garment and the recreations was very similar to laboratory based work we are currently conducting at Shrivenham. This is important because it means we might be able to answer the question "how hard were they pulled off the person".

I handed out my first Churchill coins to James and Jane to thank them for looking after me during the week.

Jane, James and I with Churchill coins

Some general pics from Canberra: