John Allison: [0:00] I'm John Allison; I'm a professor of Chemistry and Director of Forensic Chemistry program. I'm in the middle of a funding period from the Department of Justice, the National Institute of Justice to study methods for analyzing ink.


[0:15] We started with very simple inks like if you could tell what kind of pen a certain ink came from and now we're looking for sophisticated inks like inkjet printer inks to analyze forgeries; just about anything people can make at home today with a good scanner and a good inkjet printer.

Josette Marrero: [0:34] Basically we're taking inkjet printers and we're analyzing the dyes and pigments that they use in the inks. Right now this big printer right here, I'm actually working on it. It has like ten different ink cartridges in it. I am trying to use microspectrophotometry to figure out what's inside of it. Like what kind of inks its uses.


[0:54] It's really realistic and I feel like I like the project because it has a lot of applications in question document analysis. Like this is what the real forensic scientists do, so I think that's really interesting.

John Allison: [1:04] We've been working on this funded project now for almost two years and we're at a point where we're ready to write a couple papers. Part of this summer we're starting some new projects and part of the summer we're spending writing some manuscripts that my students and I will be submitting to some forensic journals.


[1:24] It's a page from the Koran. This is one of the documents that we'll be testing to see whether it's authentic or a forgery based on a chemical analysis of the paper and the components to determine whether they are modern components, modern chemicals or chemicals that were actually used more than 500 years ago.


[1:42] This is a page from the First King James version of the Bible. The first actual printing on a printing press 1600's and again it's something that is valuable if it's authentic. It could be a forgery.


[2:01] This is another example of something that we like to analyze just to demonstrate that we have the analytical capability for evaluating any kind of questioned document to determine whether it's authentic or not.

Josette Marrero: [2:13] I think the MUSE program is really great like I know that a lot of other universities don't have summer research programs. TCNJ is actually putting up the money for us to do this research and I think it's a great opportunity. What better way to spend two months than working with your professor on a project that you know you feel really close to.

Speaker 1: [02:39] It's really great being part of this program. I like working closely with the faculty. Dr. Allison is a great mentor and it's definitely helping me gain a lot of valuable skills that I'll be able to use probably in another career in forensic science.

John Allison: [2:45] Well we're really fortunate to have this program here. There aren't many schools the size of College of New Jersey that are willing to invest in their students the way TCNJ has. Certainly the faculty appreciate it, students appreciate it having research experience like this helps them to get jobs and get into graduate schools. Helps faculty get publications and get grants so it's a very, very smart investment.