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Robert C. Shaler was the director of the Forensic Biology Department of the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of New York City from 1990 until his retirement in 2005. He is currently professor of biochemistry and molecular biology and director of the Forensic Science Program at Pennsylvania toon meer State University. toon minder

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It took me quite a number of years to read this book, in part because of the density of the subject matter. Dr. Shaler is part detective, part politician, and all scientist. He is the forensic leader who helped push the identification of the remains of the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks to be done by the different levels of DNA gathering available at the time. Since DNA degenerates over time, and heat helps with this decomposition, the decisions he made in the early days of this tragedy were key to identifying as many remains as they could.

The book begins on the morning of the attacks and goes from his realization of the enormity of the task, to the scientific protocols and the companies who owned them that sometimes hampered publication of findings, to the grisly descriptions of DNA samples fused together. And that sort of grisly description can't be helped because of what happened to bodies as they were crushed under the falling towers.

His anguish that he asked his staff to do the impossible is palpable, as is the cost that this work took on them and on him. Additionally, he is limited to whom he can identify because there was often nothing left of a human being.

Thankfully there is both a glossary and an index to the terms and acronyms in this book. The scientific portion was often when I put this book down while I read it through; it was only recently that I only skimmed the scientific breakdown of what test was done through which lab and what it involved and stuck instead with the story. A strong call for the need for science and scientific discovery.
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threadnsong | May 14, 2017 |

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4
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61
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#274,234
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½ 3.7
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ISBNs
13

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