Criminal and Environmental Soil Forensics

Abstract

Soils are present on the outermost layer of the Earth’s terrestrial landmass and as such cover a large (but declining) proportion of the planetary surface, playing a pivotal role in the functioning of the contemporary Earth system. Human civilisations are irrevocably bound to them, as they serve as a platform for habitation, and are literally fundamental to food, fibre and fuel production, provide a source of raw materials and act as an archaeological repository. Soils also provide a wider range of ecosystem goods and services, supporting all terrestrial habitats, cycling carbon and nutrient elements, storing and purifying water, acting as a biodiversity reservoir, and regulating atmospheric gases. Soils are amongst the most complex of known systems. Surface soils comprise a diverse mixture of inorganic and organic materials which are physically structured in a heterogeneous but characteristic manner across some twelve orders of magnitude, from micrometres to megametres. The biomass that they support belowground, which is predominantly microbial, significantly exceeds that aboveground. Subsoils, and the interface with the bedrock (the regolith), are less complex but also have characteristic properties and geographic distribution, as does the fundamental geology. Soil science has advanced a great deal in the past two decades, and we know increasingly more about the distribution and properties of soils, how they function, and the significance of their fundamental importance. Ironically, the increasing urbanisation of current civilisation, and reduced connections with farming and food production, is resulting in a progressive decline in the appreciation of the importance of soil by the majority of the populace. Yet, humans interact with soils wittingly for sound reasons, and sometimes unwittingly when operating nefariously. The variety in the constitution, distribution and function of soils provides an intriguing basis, and great potential, for research and application in a forensic context. Their analysis and interpretation can provide intelligence, insight and evidence in the forensic arena at a wide range of scales. This volume, based upon contributions to the Second International Conference on Environmental and Criminal Soil Forensics, held in Edinburgh in 2007, explores the conceptual and practical interplay of soils across scientific disciplines, and investigative and legal spectra. The 32 chapters that follow show that the increasing convergence of a wide range o