Egyptian Journal of Forensic Sciences (2016) 6, 179–184

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Egyptian Journal of Forensic Sciences

journal homepage: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/egyptian-journal-of-forensic-sciences

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Development of latent fingerprints on

wet non-porous surfaces with SPR based

on basic fuchsin dye

* Corresponding author.E-mail addresses: rrohatgi2010@gmail.com (R. Rohatgi),

anupkapoor46@rediffmail.com (A.K. Kapoor).

Peer review under responsibility of The International Association of

Law and Forensic Sciences (IALFS).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ejfs.2015.05.0072090-536X ª 2015 The International Association of Law and Forensic Sciences (IALFS). Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V.This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Richa Rohatgi *, A.K. Kapoor

Department of Anthropology, University of Delhi, Delhi 110007, India

Received 13 April 2015; accepted 22 May 2015Available online 15 July 2015

KEYWORDS

Fingerprints;

Forensic science;

Small particle reagent

Abstract: Small particle reagent (SPR) is a technique performed to detect latent fingerprints left on

wet and moist surfaces based upon the reaction between fatty acid residuals present in the traces

and hydrophobic tails of the specific reagent. Those tails are linked to a hydrophilic head of zinc

carbonate based formulation to give coloured precipitate. In the present study, we have prepared

a novel SPR formulation constituting of zinc carbonate based on basic fuchsin dye for the develop-

ment of latent fingerprints on wet surfaces. It was shown to develop clear, sharp and detailed fin-

gerprints on non-porous surfaces after these were immersed in water for up to 45 days. The ability

of the present formulations to detect weak and chance prints not only enhances its utility, but also

its potentiality in forensic casework investigations. The raw materials used to prepare the SPR are

cost-effective and non-hazardous.ª 2015 The International Association of Law and Forensic Sciences (IALFS). Production and hosting by

Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/

licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

1. Introduction

Criminals usually tread carefully and try not to leave anytraces at the scene of the crime. Investigators are frequently

faced with the fingerprint detection and their subsequent devel-opment tasks. In some cases offenders try to destroy the tracesby throwing items, e.g., bottles, firearms, plastics, foils, etc. inwater or by exposing the scene and objects to extreme

conditions like arson. Previously many researchers have devel-

oped and used fingerprint powder formulations, with each for-mula consisting of a colourant for contrast and a resinousmaterial for good adhesion. Hundreds of fingerprint powder

formulas have been developed over the years. In the past, pow-der dusting, ninhydrin dipping, iodine fuming and silvernitrate soaking, cyanoacrylate fuming were the most com-

monly used techniques for latent print development. These tra-ditional techniques are quite effective for many surfaces.1–5

However, these traditional methods for latent print detection

are not always effective and scientists have attempted toimprove the existing methods for the visualization of latentprints. The list of different powders which have been used byvarious workers6–28 for the development of latent fingerprints

on different surfaces is shown in Table 1.

Table 1 Displays various chemical powders used by different workers for development of latent fingerprints.

Sudan III Bridges (1963)6

Lead powder Graham (1969)7

Rhodamine 6G Almog and Gabay (1980)8

Titanium oxide powder Goode and Morris (1983)9

Rhodamine B dye Kerr et al. (1983)10 and Sodhi et al. (2003)21

Rhodamine 6G Sears and Fitzgerald (2003)11 and Exline et al. (2003)22

Fluorescein dye Kerr et al. (1983)12

Basic fuchsin dye Howard (1993)13and Sodhi et al. (2004)25

Eosin blue dye Sodhi et al. (1997)14 and Dhall et al. (2013)27

Eosin yellow dye Sodhi and Kaur (1999)15 and Dhall et al. (2013)27

Phloxine B dye Sodhi and Kaur (2000)16

Guinea green dye Sodhi and Kaur (2001)17

Aniline blue dye Sodhi and Kaur (2002)18

Azure I dye Sodhi et al. (2003)19

Azure II dye Sodhi and Kaur (2004)20

Basic yellow 40 Exline et al. (2003)22

Basic red Exline et al. (2003)22

Congo red dye Sodhi et al. (2003)23

Cyano blue dye Sodhi and Kaur (2004)24

Crystal violet dye Sodhi and Kaur (2012)26 and Rohatgi et al. (2014)28

180 R. Rohatgi, A.K. Kapoor

SPR is a technique performed to detect latent fingerprintsleft on wet or moist surfaces based upon the reaction between

the fatty-acid residuals present in the traces and hydrophobictails of the specific reagents. Those tails are linked to a hydro-philic head, which reacts with metal salt to give coloured pre-

cipitate. In conventional small particle reagent, a suspension ofmolybdenum disulphide in a surfactant solution is used as abase material. Zinc carbonate, titanium dioxide and ferric

oxide are some other materials used in SPR. However, as thebase material is grey in colour, the fingerprints developed ondark coloured surfaces are not sufficiently clear due to lackof contrast.29–31 Therefore, a formulation based on white

coloured basic zinc carbonate, basic fuchsin and a commercialliquid detergent was prepared for developing latent finger-prints on crime scene evidence that were exposed to water

Picture 1 Latent prints developed on non-porous metallic surfaces a

with formulation B.

for varied periods of time. The present study is done toinvestigate if novel SPR formulation prepared can recover

latent fingerprints on glass and metal surfaces submerged instagnant water at various time intervals. The subsequentresults were compared with already in use SPR formulation

based on crystal violet dye to conclude its efficacy.28

2. Materials and methods

2.1. Materials

Basic zinc carbonate was purchased from Glaxo Laboratories,while basic fuchsin and crystal violet were procured fromSigma–Aldrich32 and GenteelR liquid detergent was used as

fter immersion in water (a) 5 days with formulation A; (b) 10 days

Picture 2 Fingerprints developed by formulation A, after immersion for (a) 10 days and (b) 20 days, respectively.

Picture 3 Latent prints developed with formulation A, after immersion for (a) 30 days on glass slide and (b) 35 days aluminium foil slide

respectively.

Development of latent fingerprints on wet non-porous surfaces with SPR 181

the surfactant solution. 20 individuals, both males and females,with variable donor capabilities, were asked for their con-sented groomed fingerprints for the study.

Latent fingerprints were developed on metallic spoon, alu-minium foil and glass slide simulating metal body firearms,knives, door knobs, bottles etc. where there is higher probabil-

ity of culprit leaving chance impressions. The fingerprints wereimpinged on selected non-porous surfaces. These wereimmersed in clean water for 45 days and their development

through SPR composition was done every day. The experimentwas conducted in the summer season in Delhi, India when thetemperature was 40–43 �C and relative humidity was 26–34%.

For evaluating shelf life, the composition was stored in a

glass beaker covered with an aluminium foil under ambient

laboratory conditions. The test solution remained stable forabout 50 days.

2.2. Method

Two formulations A and B were prepared. For formulation A,a suspension of 5.0 g of basic zinc carbonate in 75 ml distilled

water, 100 mg basic fuchsin dye and 0.3 ml commercial liquiddetergent was added. Formulation B was prepared by adding100 mg crystal violet to a suspension of 5.0 g of basic zinc car-

bonate in 75 ml distilled water followed by 0.3 ml of commer-cial liquid detergent. About 200 ml of clean water was taken inseparate containers, so as to simulate conditions of a suspectedweapon recovered, from a flowing river or a stagnant pool of

Picture 4 Images of latent prints developed with formulation B, after 40 days of immersion in water on spoon and glass slide

respectively.

Table 2 Finger mark quality scale.

Grade Description

0 No visible prints

1 Poor quality, very few visible ridges

2 Poor quality, some ridge details visible or partial mark

with limited characteristics

3 Reasonable quality, ridge-details and some characteristics

visible, identification possible

4 Good quality prints, ridge-details and characteristics

visible, probable identification

5 Excellent quality, very clear prints, identification assured

182 R. Rohatgi, A.K. Kapoor

water, for two dye solutions, respectively. Thirty sets of threesurfaces, impinged with latent fingerprints were immersed in

both containers for 45 days. One set of three surfaces wastaken out and sprayed with both SPR formulations separatelyevery day for 45 days. The formulations were given one minute

to react with the wetted latent fingerprint. The surfaces werewashed under a gentle stream of water for 20–30 s and thendried for 40 s. Clear and sharp fingerprints could be observed

as in Pictures 1–4.To determine the quality level of fingerprint development a

Finger mark Quality Scale assessment33 was used Table 2.

Table 3 Quality (grades) of developed fingerprints on wet non-por

Immersion period (in days) 1–5 6–10 11–15 16–

Formulation A

Metallic spoon 5 5 5 5

Aluminium foil 5 5 5 5

Glass slide 5 4 3 2

Formulation B

Metallic spoon 5 5 5 5

Aluminium foil 5 5 5 4

Glass slide 5 4 3 2

3. Results and discussion

Small particle reagent technique has proved its worth in detect-ing fingerprints on moist, non-porous smooth surfaces. In thepresent experimental study both formulations A and B provide

evidence of clear, sharp and good contrast results on alu-minium foil, metallic spoon and glass surfaces. The resultsshown for the first 20 days have been excellent by both formu-

lations A and B on all three surfaces. Thereafter a considerabledecrease in the quality of prints developed by both formula-tions was observed.

Composition A developed sufficiently clear and identifiablefingerprints on all three non-porous surfaces which hadremained in clean water for up to 30 days (mean 3.33) whilecomposition B gave reasonably good results up to 20 days

on all three surfaces (mean 3.33).The most suitable surface which showed reasonable quality

of ridge-details and identifiable characteristics with mean 3.8

was aluminium foil that is to say, there was no one instancewhen prints developed on aluminium foil gave print gradingbelow 2. On the contrary, the glass slide was found to be the

least productive surface in terms of developing latent printsunder wet conditions. It was observed from the experimentthat the clarity of the prints decreases with an increase in

ous surfaces.

20 21–25 26–30 31–35 36–40 41–45

5 5 4 3 2

4 4 3 2 1 and 0

2 1 and 0

4 3 2 1 and 0

3 2 1 and 0

2 1 and 0

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

Formula�on A Formula�on B Formula�on A Formula�on B Formula�on A Formula�on B

Metallic spoon Aluminum Foil Glass slide

1-10 days

11-20 days

21-30 days

31-40 days

41-50 days

Graph 1 Shows the comparative of two formulations A and B on different surfaces w.r.t. immersion period.

Development of latent fingerprints on wet non-porous surfaces with SPR 183

immersion time irrespective of the surface type. Thus, it can beconcluded from the above experiment that formulation Adevelops excellent results on aluminium foil immersed in waterfor up to 30 days. It may also be concluded from the above

experiment that SPR based on basic fuchsin and crystal violetcan be a good substitute to conventional SPR because of theirfluorescent contrasting and non-toxic properties. Results are

presented in Table 3 and Graph 1.

4. Conclusion

The aim of this study was to evaluate the possibility of devel-oping fingerprints with uniquely formulated composition A onsurfaces submerged in water. It can, therefore, be concluded

that this aim has been achieved, showing that, even underwet and moist conditions, it is possible to develop finger marksand that infallible evidence such as fingerprints should not be

overlooked on physical evidences found in drainage water,pool, river etc. The results showed that the most effectivemethod for developing finger marks on non-porous surfacesexposed to water is SPR.30 The new SPR composition proved

to give better results when compared with results given by for-mulation B. The raw materials used for preparing the presentsmall particle reagent are cost-effective and easily available.

These pose no occupational hazard to the user.

Funding

UGC assisted this study financially in the form of JuniorResearch Fellowship to the corresponding author.

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from the participants of thestudy.

Ethical approval

Necessary ethical approval was obtained from the university’s

ethical committee.

Conflict of interest

None.

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