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        <title>The forensic eye</title>
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        <link>http://my.rsc.org/index.php?page_id=1007&amp;module_name=sblog_info&amp;sblog_id=69&amp;group_id=&amp;tk=571s4Yc4GYsdS6gjjP6zXzfqBWHCu2g3BJhl_3LyQ_w,&amp;tm=vLkf1pvmRgsaZkNpa9rBi3QzI77SmUoQbfQJQED2-Pc,</link>
        <lastBuildDate>Wed, 19 Jun 2013 15:44:43 +0100</lastBuildDate>
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        <pubDate>Wed, 19 Jun 2013 15:44:00 +0100</pubDate>
        <item>
            <title>Parkinson's and forensics</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/1050</link>
            <description><![CDATA[I have an interesting case of intentional overdose with levodopa at the moment.



Levodopa (or L-DOPA) is a precursor to dopamine. During Parkinson&#39;s disease, the cells that generate dopamine neurons in the brain die. The resulting lack of dopamine causes the typical Parkinson&#39;s motor symptoms such as tremors, stooping and slow gait.

Treatment with levodopa is known as&nbsp;dopamine-replacement therapy&nbsp;and is highly effective, but chronic use of levodopa can lead to further motor symptoms.

Overdose on Parkinson&#39;s medication is unusual, and small molecules like levodopa are difficult to analyse for in a forensic context.&nbsp;

A recent book on drug discovery that I edited had a few interesting options for other future therapies. In order from the sublime to the ridiculous:&nbsp;


	
		Exercise&nbsp;&ndash;&nbsp;this is recommended for Parkinson&#39;s patients because it increases the production of neurotrophic &nbsp;factors. Neurotrophic factors are proteins that are responsible for the growth and survival of neurons.


	
		Caffeine&nbsp;&ndash; and other xanthines protect dopamine neurons, although their protective mechanism is unclear.


	
		Smoking&nbsp;&ndash; yes really. Apparently smoking can protect against the development of Parkison&#39;s diease. Although smoking-related diseases are still of course a major risk.


	
		​Methamphetamine&nbsp;&ndash; honestly! Low concentrations of methamphetamine are thought to result in cells that are less vulnerable to oxidative stress...


<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />May 14, 2013 8:54 am<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Tue, 14 May 2013 08:54:20 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/1050</guid>
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            <title>Parental guidance required</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/817</link>
            <description><![CDATA[or &#39;for mature audiences&#39; as we say Down Under.

This post is about comedy drug names I came across this week.

Chavicine&nbsp;

Yes really. Chavicine is a real name. It&#39;s a component of freshly ground black pepper. I say &#39;freshly&#39; as chavicine is an isomer of piperine and over time will transform into piperine, changing the flavour of the pepper.

Erectile dysfunction drugs

The prescription versions of these drugs have rather dull names like Viagra&nbsp;but there is a thriving market in &#39;herbal&#39; erectile dysfunction remedies. These are popular with those who aren&#39;t keen to consult with their GP.

In my lab we occasionally get sent samples of these remedies to find out what (if any) active ingredients are present in them. The names of these preparations range from the innocuous&nbsp;Hero&nbsp;and&nbsp;Real Man to the decidedly unsubtle&nbsp;Rock Hard, Keepitup and&nbsp;Stiff One to&nbsp;the frankly alarming&nbsp;Cockstar.

There is a serious (ahem) point about these remedies which is that many consumers believe them to be completely safe because they are often sold with labelling suggesting they are all-natural alternatives. In fact, they can often contain undisclosed prescription drugs and non-drug adulterants (more on these later).

The fact that some contain sildenafil (Viagra) itself may not appear on the face of it to be a problem, except that sildenafil should not be taken with certain prescription medications as the combined effects may lower blood pressure to unsafe levels.

It&#39;s quite common to find absolutely no active ingredients at all in these remedies and actually just find things like gypsum, fertilisers, printing ink and paint.

An interesting old-style erectile dysfunction drug is the opiate papverine which occurs naturally in the opium derived from certain types of poppy. It&#39;s fallen out of fashion now as it has to be administered by intracavernosal injection over two minutes. Although the &#39;effects&#39; lasts for up to four hours it seems rather unlikely that a sharp needle at the base of the penis would put anyone in the mood...

<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />Sep 8, 2012 9:32 am<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Sat, 08 Sep 2012 09:32:28 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/817</guid>
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            <title>Maggots and toxicology</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/739</link>
            <description><![CDATA[Don&#39;t gross out &ndash; there won&#39;t be any photos of maggoty bodies in this post.

I have a case involving a walker (or &#39;tramper&#39; as they&#39;re known Down Under) who wasn&#39;t found for a few weeks. By which time maggots had decided to move in and the CSI-watching pathologist has sent me a few with the request &#39;please analyse the maggots for alcohol and drugs&#39;.

Hmm. In the offending episode of CSI: insert city here one of the lab boffins is asked to &#39;tox the maggots&#39; in a similar case. After crushing the maggot in a mortar and pestle then wedging the remains into the GC-MS, a spectrum matching jimsonweed appears approximately 15 seconds later.

Back in the real world it&#39;s not that easy.

Superficially, the reasoning behind toxing the maggots is sound. As the maggots slowly digest the body, they will consume any alcohol or drugs present in the blood and tissues at the time of death. However:

	
		analysing a maggot would actually involve an elaborate extraction process (possibly taking two or more days) and even then the number of interfering compounds, fatty acids etc., in the GC-MS spectrum is likely to be huge;
	
		it would be almost impossible to find a positive control &ndash; a sample to prove that drugs and alcohol can be seen in a maggoty matrix &ndash; save for finding a live maggot and persuading it to take various drugs;
	
		even if drugs were found in the maggots, how do we prove that they came from that particular body? Maybe the maggots aren&#39;t picky and will digest multiple bodies;
	
		any drug concentrations we did find wouldn&#39;t be open to meaningful interpretation. There aren&#39;t tables of concentrations in the literature for drugs and alcohol in maggots we can use for comparison;
	
		finally, there is the possibility of biomagnification (see Silent Spring) which would falsely represent the concentration of drugs in the body at the time of death.

As such, I think I&#39;ll be sticking to analysing the body fluids for this case.

As an aside, jimsonweed is quite an interesting plant. It also goes by the brilliant name &#39;devil&#39;s trumpet&#39; and contains atropine. It is abused for its ability to induce delirium.<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />Jun 27, 2012 11:15 am<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Wed, 27 Jun 2012 11:15:13 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/739</guid>
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            <title>Poisons in the time of Shakespeare</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/716</link>
            <description><![CDATA[A recent case I came across involving a young couple, drug overdosage and stab wounds was very reminiscent of Romeo &amp; Juliet.

In the play, each of the star-crossed lovers consumes a different poison. All of the poisons, and indeed medications, available during Shakespeare&#39;s time (16th and 17th centuries) would have been plant-derived. The chemicals were extracted from plant leaves and flowers either by boiling in water or by soaking in alcohol.

Juliet takes a potion, with the intention of only simulating death, made from deadly nightshade. Deadly nightshade (or Atropa Belladona) contains atropine.


Atropine actually has some medical uses (as fans of the film The Rock may remember), but in high doses it can cause cardiac excitement, hallucinations, coma, circulatory collapse and respiratory failure.

Romeo, on the other hand, takes a potion derived from monkshood (or Aconitum napellus) which contains aconitine. This poison has survived the literature test of time and even gets a mention in Harry Potter. Aconitine poisoning causes sweating, nausea, intense pain and, finally, respiratory paralysis.

The modern-day version of this story involved zopiclone, a sedative&ndash;hypnotic which is definitely not plant-derived but highly effective all the same, and a common finding in modern forensic toxicology.



<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />Jun 13, 2012 8:23 am<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Wed, 13 Jun 2012 08:23:33 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/716</guid>
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            <title>Harry Potter Forensics</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/661</link>
            <description><![CDATA[Harry Potter fans might remember the poisonous plants monkshood and wolfsbane from the first book.

The actual poison in both plants is called aconitine, and we have a case of fatal aconitine poisoning in the lab at the moment.

It&#39;s not a very common poison so quite a bit of method development was needed to detect it in body fluids. Some victims of aconitine poisoning accidentally eat the plant in the wild, others consume it intentionally.

In this case it was consumed as dry plant material, the victim having bought it as a Chinese Herbal Medicine. Aconitine is &#39;prescribed&#39; for any number of things from impotence, to something called warming therapy to heart problems.

Although we&#39;ll never know why the poisonee decided to take the aconitine, it might have been for their existing heart condition. Unfortunately for them, they were already being prescribed a Western medication and the combination of the two proved fatal.

Even more unfortunately, the victim didn&#39;t have a bezoar to hand...



<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />Apr 21, 2012 8:57 am<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Sat, 21 Apr 2012 08:57:23 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/661</guid>
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            <title>Evidence of bees</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/656</link>
            <description><![CDATA[I think some pathologists watch too much CSI. The other day a sudden death case came into the lab where the victim was known to have a bee sting allergy. There was some suggestion from an eye-witness that she had been stung by a bee, causing anaphylaxis.

The bee sting had apparently caused histamine to flood into the heart leading to a coronary spasm and ultimately a heart attack.

Anyway, a blood sample arrived in the lab with the request &#39;please look for evidence of bees&#39;.

After looking for a bee in the liquid and listening for buzzing we were fresh out of ideas so I started looking into bee venom (known as apitoxin) for an obvious biomarker. There is one and it&#39;s called melittin. Unfortunately it&#39;s not a small drug molecule like most of the things we look for in tox, but a 26 amino acid polypeptide.

This means that if we want to extract it from and detect it in blood, it&#39;s going to mean a great deal of method development. This would be a really interesting research project but not really justifiable given the number of deaths per year due to bee venom (only 20 deaths in the UK).

Apparently they can do it on CSI though...<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />Apr 13, 2012 11:05 am<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Fri, 13 Apr 2012 11:05:29 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/656</guid>
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            <title>Drug driving in New Zealand</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/635</link>
            <description><![CDATA[
I&#39;ve been seeing TV ads from a major new campaign in New Zealand about driving under the influence of drugs.

http://www.youtube.com/drugdrivingquestion

Although all involved in the videos were actors, apparently, the passengers weren&#39;t in on it. As well as the videos there are posters all over the public transport in Wellington.

The kiwis have a quite different approach to DUI cases than elswhere in the World. New legislation (from 2009) makes it an offence to &#39;drive while impaired with blood that contains evidence of use of a controlled drug or prescription medicine&#39;.

Although very similar to the Road Traffic Act in the UK, the kiwis put the emphasis on the &#39;impairment&#39; part of the Act, so the police can only attempt to prosecute people who fail their roadside impairment test.

The blood sample taken by the police doctor is sent to the lab, analysed and a certificate is produced (similar to an alcohol certificate). Forensic Toxicologists only look for one drug and it&#39;s usually only cannabis or methamphetamine (known as &#39;P&#39; in New Zealand).

The upside to this is that drug driving casework scientists hardly ever go to court as their evidence is generally accepted. In the UK we often went once a week! The downside is that if the blood sample contains something other than cannabis or P, it will be missed.

The kiwis also don&#39;t determine the concentrations of any drug(s) present &ndash; as the Act is only interested in &#39;evidence of use&#39; just the presence of either the parent drug or the metabolite will do. Both of these things make research into the true prevalence of drug driving pretty tricky.

Forensic Toxicologists also have the police very well trained here who understand that there isn&#39;t a simple correlation between the concentration of a drug in the body and any driving impairment.

As for the driver getting a second opinion on the analysis, the government forensics lab is the only one in the country that can do this type of analysis. Still, they can always send the sample to Australia&hellip;<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />Mar 8, 2012 4:41 am<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Thu, 08 Mar 2012 04:41:46 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/635</guid>
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            <title>Ingesting insecticides</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/632</link>
            <description><![CDATA[There are some interesting poisonings Down Under. A case I came across a little while ago started me thinking about death by insecticide.
Acephate for example (also called Orthene) is an old-school insecticide (first appearing in the 1970s) which is used to control chewing and biting insects like aphids.
At first glance, insecticides aren't a very good choice as a poison as they are selectively toxic to insects and not mammals. In insects, acephate is activated by desulfuration, turning into the real poison – methamidophos.
So if humans can't metabolise acephate, how do poisonings occur? The thousands of deaths that occur annually worldwide due to insecticide ingestion result from acute overdose which causes hyperexcitability of the nervous system, seizures, tingling and tremors (similar to the symptoms of epilepsy).
If that doesn't sound too bad, drinking insecticides also causes nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. It seems unlikely that anyone would drink these chemicals accidentally too. The control sample in the lab, despite being wrapped in two plastic bags and stuffed in a filing cabinet still smells indescribably bad...
<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />Mar 6, 2012 5:07 am<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Tue, 06 Mar 2012 05:07:06 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/632</guid>
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            <title>Beating employment drug screening</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/558</link>
            <description><![CDATA[As part of the pre-employment checks for my new Forensic Toxicology job I did a drugs of abuse test last week. This seems to be quite common Down Under, particularly in jobs that are safety-critical like aviation, construction and emergency services.
Technically, I suppose I should have enough toxicology knowledge to avoid a positive result if I wanted to take illegal drugs (which, of course I don't) but I was surprised at the number of precautions the testing centre have to take to stop people 'beating the test'. I hadn't thought of any of these tactics! So, the precautions were:
		Full-body pat down, airport style − this is to ensure you don't have a container with someone else's urine in it in your pockets apparently.
	
		You have to wash your hands in front of the nurse − now you can't excuse a positive result by saying you had drugs on your hands.
	
		The taps are now disabled − no filling the little container up with tap water.
	
		The toilet itself contains bright blue water − so it would be pretty obvious if you filled up your container from the toilet bowl.
	
		After filling up the container you weren't allowed to flush the loo − for a number of reasons, like to check the colour of the water. If it's now green it means you actually went rather than using someone else's sample. Also it's possible that depending on where the blue agent is added, the water might be clear when you flush so you could use that to fill up your container.
	
		The nurse now checks the colour and tests the temperature of the sample to make sure it's 37 °C − just in case you'd managed to sneak in some previously refrigerated urine hidden somewhere (let's not dwell on where for too long).

<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />Dec 1, 2011 1:55 pm<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Thu, 01 Dec 2011 13:55:48 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/558</guid>
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            <title>Drug driving Down Under</title>
            <link>http://my.rsc.org/blogs/69/554</link>
            <description><![CDATA[I seem to be on an accidental mission to travel across the world and investigate driving under the influence of drugs in different countries.
I started in the UK back in September 2010, then Canada in April 2011, now I'm in Australia and will soon be in New Zealand having a nosy at their drug-driving problems.
Anyway, here in Queensland in the sticky November weather, driving under the influence of drugs is a bigger problem than drink driving! This is apparently due to a number of factors:

		High-profile media campaigns reinforcing the idea that drink driving is a really stupid idea.
	
		Random breath testing (this is illegal in the UK, the police need to have good reason to suspect you've been drinking, such as they just saw you stumble out of a pub...)
	
		Double penalty points around Christmas and New Year.
	
		A zero mg% limit for new drivers.
	
		Testing of all drivers and passengers involved in an RTA.

All good stuff for reducing drink driving, but what about drug driving? Well, the Aussies are ahead of lots of countries with their roadside oral fluid testing machines, however the system for dealing with drug-driver samples is very different.
<br /><br />Posted by brownsuitgirl<br />Nov 28, 2011 12:12 pm<hr noshade />]]></description>
            <pubDate>Mon, 28 Nov 2011 12:12:18 +0100</pubDate>
            <guid>my.rsc.org/blogs/69/554</guid>
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