Forensic Science Undergraduate Programmes 2020 2020 entry | Page 3

Undergraduate Programmes 2020 | 3 Welcome to Forensic Science Welcome to Forensic Science at Keele University. This brochure is intended to tell you more about the undergraduate degree programmes we offer and what it is like to study Forensic Science at Keele. But don’t just take our word for it. Find out what some of our graduates feel about their Keele experience, read what career choices they have made and how their Forensic Science degree from Keele has prepared them for life after university. Forensic Science is often defined as the application of science to the work of the courts of law. In many people’s minds this leads to a focus on crime scene investigation which, though a very important part of the forensic process, does not fully provide a true picture of what the forensic scientist actually does and what knowledge and skills you need to be a professional forensic scientist. So what makes forensic science distinctive and why is a degree in forensic science different to studying other sciences? The forensic discipline embraces a wide range of scientific topics, many of which are based on analytical science – the science of measurement, characterising materials, usually at the molecular level, and determining what is in a sample and how much of various components are there. Secondly, it is problem-based where the problem is explaining the physical evidence, and so the scientist has to be able to devise and apply methods of experimental investigation and analysis appropriate to each individual situation. Such scientific investigations are applied to physical evidence - that is materials found at crime scenes or associated with potentially illegal activities; examples include explosive residues, drugs, inks, glass fragments, fire accelerants, paints, fibres and hairs. In practice this means using microscopy, chromatography, spectroscopy and related specialist techniques which are also fundamental to some laboratory work in chemistry, biology and geology, to examine forensic materials. Forensic science also includes the science of pattern matching as applied to fingerprints, shoe- marks, tool-marks and tyre-marks as well as other specialist areas of study which are relevant to forensic investigation such as pathology, anthropology, blood-spatter analysis, ballistics, geosciences and digital sciences. Firstly, forensic science is a broadly-based discipline incorporating many aspects of the core sciences so if you enjoy working across several areas of science then forensic science may be for you. Thirdly, the forensic scientist needs to understand the context of the case in order to properly interpret the experimental results and communicate their meaning to the court. This also implies that the forensic scientist must be able to explain their scientific work in a clear and understandable way to non-scientists such as those work in the legal system. These generic attributes of the forensic scientist are also strongly relevant to the analytical scientist working in business and industry where the problems relate to commercial products, their development, production and quality control; for example, in the environmental, pharmaceutical or chemical products sectors. For this reason, studying a forensic science degree with a strong emphasis on analytical science will prepare you well for a wide range of science-based careers outside of the forensic business sector, as well as within it. keele.ac.uk/forensic