NCJ Number
80058
Date Published
1981
Length
88 pages
Annotation
This 1980 annual report of the Home Office Central Research Establishment (HOCRE) in the United Kingdom discusses accomplishments and problems overcome during the year and includes reports of the agency's four main divisions.
Abstract
HOCRE provides research and operational services to a well-established network of operational forensic laboratories throughout the United Kingdom. The agency has a permanent commitment to quality assurance matters, the screening of alcohol devices, answering inquiries from various laboratories, the provision of computer services, and to drugs intelligence activities, as well as to the provision of standard reagents. The biology division has four sections: biochemistry, immunology, serology, and general biology. Projects undertaken in 1980 concerned enzymes in hair-root sheath cells, identification of deer blood, sexing of bloodstains, animal hairs, and cross-contamination studies. The chemistry division devoted almost 40 percent of its total staff effort to evaluating breath testing devices and developing methods of fingerprint detection. The drugs and toxicology division devoted its research efforts to the main areas of barbiturates, analysis of drugs in small samples of blood and urine, mass spectrometry, and interpretation of drug and metabolic tissue concentrations. The operational services division has several sections, of which one, the computer section, spent much time becoming familiar with the PRIME computer acquired in 1979. This section also prepared user guides, trained staff, and rewrote all the original programs to run as multiuser programs. Data tables, casework statistics, HOCRE papers published in journals and in press, a listing of staff, a telephone directory for HOCRE, and other related matters are appended.