Spectricon’ s SMMART technology has been ranked first in a pan European pre-commercial procurement (PCP) action (SHUTTLE). The company has implemented several installations in leading European forensics Labs and has successfully passed the Site Acceptance Tests
Spectricon has developed and patented the SMMART Multimodal microscope together with its application in forensics science
SMMART is a Spectral Multimodal Microscope for the Automated Recognition of Traces (SMMART) forensics toolkit.
The SMMART forensics toolkit created the blend of digital imaging, spectroscopy, robotics, machine learning, data structuring and analytics.
It is a novel, high-content screening solution, offering efficient collection and automated (unsupervised) identification, enumeration and documentation of an enormous number of lifted traces, within a few hours.
Spectricon’ s SMMART technology has been ranked first in a pre-commercial procurement (PCP) action, which was coordinated and jointly carried out between forensic institutes across Europe (the Shuttle Project) and has passed successfully the site acceptance tests, conducted in the aforementioned institutes.
Taping bodies or crime scenes is a standard practice for lifting evidentially important traces and for collecting good quality material for DNA analysis
Crime scene traces are silent witnesses. Traces are numerus and often invisible. These neither collected nor analyzed.
But even if we find ways to collect them all, their analysis sets extremely unrealistic time and resource requirements
One square meter trace lifting tapes requires close to one trillion micron scale microscopy views, that may require 2500 years examination time with conventional methods.
Addressing the global demand for novel, cost effective solutions, Spectricon has developed a holistic solution offering and innovative forensics toolkit, which includes:
- A novel thin film system for efficiently lifting/encapsulating both visible and invisible traces, with superb optical clearance and neutrality, ready for microscopic examination
- A fully automated hyperspectral and multimodal microscope, with an integrated machine learning-based trace identifier. The system outputs identification maps for millions of traces, within very short time frames and in a fully unsupervised manner
SMMART innovation makes large scale tape analysis realistic, transferring routine work to machines and improving workflow
1. The novel trace lifting tape/backing system
Spectricon has developed a novel trace lifting system comprising of an adhesive tape and an A4 sized backing film, both encapsulating the collected traces.
This contamination-free trace handling system has glass slide level optical clearance (93% transparency from UV to NIR), while, at the same time is non-fluorescing and non-birefringent
The Spectricon’s innovative trace lifting/encapsulating tape and backing films
Zero background fluorescence (up) and birefringence (bottom)
Of both adhesive tape and backing film.
2. The advanced robotic hyperspectral multimodal microscope
The SMMART-HTS is capable of accommodating ultra large sample areas (640X420 cm) in a single, unsupervised scanning session. It is an ultrafast system offering:
a. Bright field transmission microscopy, including color, hyperspectral imaging and 8 million spectra per image frame, spanning a very broad spectral range (340nm-1100nm);
b. Reflectance imaging;
c. Fluorescence imaging @ 3 LED/Laser lines (365, 410, 450 nm) excitation;
d. Real time spectral polarimetry imaging and retardance/birefringence mapping
e. Magnification 265X, plus digital zoom
f. FOV 3.5 mm, 2448 pixels, 1,43 μm/pixel
g. Fully automated and manual operation
Selecting areas or subareas for scanning over the overview image, through a graphical GUI
Manual operation with joystick offers live imaging of samples at all imaging modes and random selection of fields for comparative inspection and analysis.
3. The SMMART data viewer and data base software suite
The SMMART data viewer software module allows for side-by-side review of all imaging modes, namely hyperspectral imaging, reflection, multiwavelength excitation fluorescence and polarization imaging.
It also offers zooming tools to compare multimodal imaging patterns at high magnifications, while maintaining excellent imaging quality.
The SMMART data viewer and analysis software modules can be operated from remote locations, by retrieving data from a specially developed database. Data stored in the database are encrypted and users may have escalated authority to access the content of the database.
4. The SMMART analysis and trace finder software suite
The SMMART-HTS microscope integrates an automated data analysis software for identifying, enumerating and localizing traces. It integrates a set of ultrafast machine learning-based analysis algorithms, capable of displaying trace identification maps, even concurrently with image acquisition.
Trace identification is based on the combined analysis of a long list of the acquired optical and morphological parameters, including: absorption spectra, reflectance, multi-wavelength excitation fluorescence and retardance/birefringence data, all together forming a very informative, multidimensional feature space
Per pixel, micron-scale spectroscopy for material identification
Automatic identification and enumeration of traces
The SMMART forensics toolkit is a patented innovation currently standing ready to complement the analytical capital equipment of both modern routine and research forensic labs.
The SMMART forensics toolkit is a turnkey solution that does the routine work for you.
It is also a research tool for developing new methods for advancing the evidential value of traces analysis.
It is powerful, one-stop and open to customization solution with great potential to make your practice to stand out.
