U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government, Department of Justice.

NCJRS Virtual Library

The Virtual Library houses over 235,000 criminal justice resources, including all known OJP works.
Click here to search the NCJRS Virtual Library

Carbon-Based Fingerprint Powder as a One-Step Development and Matrix Application for High-Resolution Mass Spectrometry Imaging of Latent Fingerprints

NCJ Number
254297
Journal
Journal of Forensic Sciences Volume: 64 Issue: 4 Dated: 2019 Pages: 1048-1056
Author(s)
Paige Hinners; Young J. Lee
Date Published
2019
Length
9 pages
Annotation
Since researchers have refrained from using carbon based fingerprint powder (CFP ) as a matrix due to high background and contamination, the current study reassessed the compatibility of CFP with matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry (MALDI MS ) and its imaging (MALDI MSI ), using a high-resolution mass spectrometer (HRMS) and compared to traditional organic matrices.
Abstract

The study found that relevant fingerprint compounds were easily distinguished from carbon cluster peaks when using HRMS. For fair comparison, half of a fingerprint was dusted with CFP while the other half was dusted with traditional organic matrices. All compounds studied had comparable, or higher, signal to noise (S/N) ratios when CFP was used as the matrix. Additionally, chemical image qualities closely followed the trend of S/N ratios. CFP proved to be an effective one-step development and matrix application technique for MALDI MSI of latent fingerprints, when carbon cluster peaks are well separated by a HRMS. (publisher abstract modified)