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First forensic science manual published by the Chinese. This was the first known record of medical knowledge being used to solve criminal cases.
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First pathology reports published.
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First recorded instance of physical matching of evidence leading to a murder conviction (John Toms, England).
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German chemist Valentin Ross developed a method of detecting arsenic in a victim's stomach, thus advancing the investigation of poison deaths.
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James Marsh, an English chemist, uses chemical processes to determine arsenic as the cause of death in a murder trial.
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Henry Faulds and William James Herschel publish a paper describing the uniqueness of fingerprints.
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Juan Vucetich, an Argentinean police officer, is the first to use fingerprints as evidence in a murder investigation.
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Victor Balthazard and Marcelle Lambert publish first study on hair, including microscopic studies from most animals.
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First police crime lab established in Los Angeles.
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Prototype polygraph, which was invented by John Larson in 1921, developed for use in police stations.
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A sound spectrograph discovered to be able to record voices.
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Royal Canadian Mounted Police implement first automatic fingerprint identification system.
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National Academy of Sciences announces DNA evidence is reliable.
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Britain's Forensic Science Service develops online footwear coding and detection system. This helps police to identify footwear marks quickly.
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Michigan state university develops software that automatically matches hand-drawn facial sketches to mug shots stored in databases.
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Japanese researchers develop a dental x-ray matching system. This system can automatically match dental x-rays in a database, and makes a positive match in less than 4 seconds.