Spatter Pattern - Water, not blood
Posted: Wed Sep 28, 2016 6:32 am
Do the rules for spatter pattern analysis for blood work for water too?
muskrats65,
A very good question. While I'm not an expert in blood splatter analysis, I don't believe pure water would be a good analog for blood. The way blood pools, splatters, drips, etc is based heavily on its basic properties as a function of the materials that make it up. Blood is made up of liquid, in the firm of plasma and serum, as well as solids, such as red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets, etc. Inside the body, this mixture is in a liquid state, but upon contact with air, quickly begins to clot into a solid, gel-like substance that becomes thicker as time goes on. These factors will combine in various ways that will affect the surface tension, mass, viscosity, etc in such a way that is completely different than pure water. I think if you were looking to perform blood splatter analysis without using real blood, you try to create a simi-liquid that replicates the properties of blood.
Here is a website that discusses in detail what I've covered above and includes a fake blood recipe.
http://reekoscience.com/science-experim ... r-analysis