Analysis of Automotive Paint Smears Using Attenuated Total Reflection Infrared Microscopy

• NCJ Number: 307459
• Journal: Applied Spectroscopy Volume: 77 Issue: 3 Dated: 2023 Pages: 281-291
• Author(s): George P. Affadu-Danful; A. Kaan Kalkan; Linqi Zhang; Barry K. Lavine
• Date Published: 2023
• Length: 11 pages
• Grant Number(s): 2017-IJ-CX-0022
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Research (Applied/Empirical)
• Award: Application of Raman and Infrared Microscopy for the Forensic Examination of Automotive Clear Coats and Paint Smears

Annotation

This article discusses the development of a procedure based on an impact tester to create smears to simulate paint transfer between vehicles during a collision.

Abstract

A procedure based on an impact tester has been developed to create smears to simulate paint transfer between vehicles during a collision. The results of this study indicate that paint smears developed using an impactor can serve as the basis of realistic proficiency tests for forensic laboratories. Paint smears represent a type of automotive paint sample found at a crime scene that is problematic for forensic automotive paint examiners to analyze as there are no reference materials present in automotive paint databases to generate hit-lists of potential suspect vehicles. Realistic paint smears are difficult to create in a laboratory and have also proven challenging to analyze because of the mixing of the various automotive paint layers. Data collected from 24 original equipment manufacturer (OEM) paints in simulated collisions using an impact tester with a steel (inert) substrate to simulate vehicle to vehicle collisions shows that attenuated total reflection infrared microscopy can isolate individual paint layers. For each OEM paint sample, the corresponding smear obtained was dependent upon the conditions used. By varying these conditions, the number of distinct layers obtained could be tuned for each of the OEM paints investigated. Furthermore, the IR spectrum of each layer extracted from the paint smear using alternating least squares was found to compare favorably to an in-house OEM paint infrared spectral library for each layer as the correct match (make and model of the vehicle from which the smear originated) was always found as a top five hit in the hit-list. (Published Abstract Provided)