Could plants help us find dead bodies? Forensic botanists want to know
Published Date: 9/3/2020
Source: phys.org
Search teams looking for human remains are often slowed by painstaking on-foot pursuits or aerial searches that are obscured by forest cover. In a Science & Society article appearing September 3 in the journal Trends in Plant Science, the authors discuss utilizing tree cover in body recovery missions to our advantage, by detecting changes in the plant's chemistry as signals of nearby human remains. Though the impact of human decomposition on plants has not yet been thoroughly explored, the researchers outline the steps needed to make body recovery using vegetation more of a reality.