Predictive Soil Provenancing (PSP): An Innovative Forensic Soil Provenance Analysis Tool

Area of Science:

• Forensic Science
• Geospatial Analysis
• Soil Science

Background:

• Soil is a critical evidence type in forensic and intelligence operations.
• Existing soil composition databases are often insufficient for detailed analysis.
• High-resolution soil attribute rasters offer a potential solution.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce and validate a novel method for reducing forensic soil search areas.
• To demonstrate the utility of publicly available soil attribute rasters in forensic investigations.
• To enhance the efficiency and objectivity of soil provenancing.

Main Methods:

• Utilizing high-resolution (~90m) soil attribute rasters as predictive models.
• Searching rasters for pixels matching evidentiary soil sample composition within confidence limits.
• Applying the Predictive Soil Provenancing (PSP) approach.

Main Results:

• The PSP approach successfully reduced the potential search area for forensic soil samples.
• Demonstrated a reduction in search area to less than 10% of the original investigation area in an example case.
• Validated the method's effectiveness in narrowing down soil provenance.

Conclusions:

• Predictive Soil Provenancing (PSP) offers a transparent, reproducible, and objective method.
• This approach significantly improves the efficiency of forensic soil analysis.
• PSP effectively reduces the likely provenance area of forensic soil samples, aiding investigations.