History of Hair and Fiber Analysis: Lab

Hairs consist primarily of the protein keratin. Hair can be defined as slender threadlike outgrowths from the skin (in more scientific terms, hair is a protein that grows out of the hair follicles of the skin). There are three parts of hair: cortex, medulla, and the cuticle. The cortex is the outside, the medulla is the very middle, and the cuticles the rest of the inside. In class, we completed a lab where we had to look at a series of hairs under microscopes and draw them.
Fibers are elongated* substances capable of being spun into yarn.
Hair analysis can tell us much more than some people may think. In a video we watched in class, a man died from thallium poisoning. At first the death was thought of as accidental. Since there was thallium at the man's workplace the authorities thought he must have accidentally injested it. However, after a drawn out investigation a different scientist came to the case. He examined some of the man's hair and made a chart that showed the different dates when the man was poisoned. Also, as the authorities examined every possible lead they found that the man's tea thermos had thallium in it. The authorities interrogated the man's wife and uncovered that she poisoned her own husband to get his money. The man was given a last dose of thallium that was huge in the very hospital that he died on his death bed. She just walked in and stayed with him and was alone and gave him thallium in his tea.

*Elongated: drawn out, stretched