Ivory or Bone? discrimination using ATR-FTIR spectroscopy and chemometrics

Area of Science:

• Forensic Science
• Analytical Chemistry
• Wildlife Conservation

Background:

• The illegal wildlife trade heavily features elephant ivory, driving demand for substitutes.
• Accurate identification of genuine ivory is vital for legal enforcement and conservation efforts.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the efficacy of ATR-FTIR spectroscopy combined with chemometrics for differentiating genuine elephant ivory from bone and synthetic substitutes.
• To establish a reliable, non-destructive method for ivory identification in forensic and legal contexts.

Main Methods:

• Analysis of Asian elephant ivory and cattle bone samples using ATR-FTIR spectroscopy.
• Application of chemometric techniques, including Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and Partial Least Squares Discriminant Analysis (PLS-DA).
• Differentiation of resin-based fake ivory through spectral comparison.

Main Results:

• PCA models achieved 98.30% accuracy in distinguishing ivory from bone.
• PLS-DA models demonstrated high accuracy (R-squared 0.99) and effectively classified ivory and bone samples.
• ATR-FTIR successfully differentiated genuine ivory from bone and fake samples, even in powdered form.

Conclusions:

• ATR-FTIR spectroscopy offers a rapid, precise, and non-destructive method for identifying genuine elephant ivory.
• This technique is effective in distinguishing ivory from bone and synthetic imitations, supporting conservation and legal actions against wildlife trafficking.