Joint Year 11 forensic science project comes to a close!

September 2018: a ‘murder’ is committed within the walls of Ecole Jeannine Manuel in Paris. Following the discovery of the body, a team of Year 11s from our schools in London and Paris are tasked with identifying the culprit! After nearly nine months of close scientific collaboration with their Parisian peers, our students headed over to Paris to close the case.

Since September, pupils had been using forensic techniques, such as fingerprinting, blood typing, Henssge Nomogram or hair sample analysis, to whittle down the original list of 15 suspects. Throughout the year, students in Paris and London worked together to collate data from their experiments and reach conclusions. By early June, the number of suspects had been reduced to three and the students travelled to Paris to carry out the final stage in their research together. Using DNA Gel Electrophoresis to analyse DNA samples recovered from the crime scene, they were able to clearly identify the killer.

For Science Teacher Mr Smyth, “this project was an excellent opportunity for Year 11 pupils to become familiar with some of the forensic techniques used in crime labs around the world, and to collaborate with students at Ecole Jeannine Manuel in Paris.”