Student Ambassador Poster Preview: Elizabeth Kowalcyzk on Low-Pass Whole-Genome Sequencing as a Cost-Effective Forensic Workflow
Elizabeth Kowalczyk expected that cutting the sequencing depth would cost her the data. It didn’t. Even at DNA inputs as low as 0.1 nanograms, her low-pass sequencing runs produced genotype accuracies above 99.8%. Her research asks whether whole-genome sequencing, usually run at a depth and price that puts it out of reach for many forensic […]
Student Ambassador Poster Preview: Xiaomeng (Simone) Yang on Predicting Body Weight and Muscularity with MicroRNAs
Simone Yang’s data told her saliva samples were the weaker ones: lower sequencing quality, fewer usable reads than blood. Then the validation results came back, and saliva held the strongest, most consistent markers in the entire study. She’s investigating whether microRNAs, small molecules that shift with a person’s metabolism and physical activity, can predict body […]
Student Ambassador Poster Preview: Irina Badell Garcia on Estimating Time Since Death with DNA Methylation
Irina Badell Garcia knew her way around CODIS STRs and mitochondrial kinship testing before her PhD even started. Then her advisor, Dr. Aaron Shafer, asked her to learn something she’d never touched: DNA methylation, at a taphonomic research facility that doesn’t have a counterpart anywhere else in Canada. Her research asks whether the chemical marks […]
It Takes a Village: The August 2026 ISHI Report is Now Available
August tends to arrive in forensic science labs with a kind of dual energy, one foot still in summer’s casework, the other already leaning toward Providence. ISHI 37 is just a few months out, and the August issue of The ISHI Report arrives in that window, a preview of some of the stories and conversations […]
Introducing the 2026 ISHI Student Ambassadors: Mia Gale
Most of the hairs collected at a crime scene were naturally shed. They have no root. Without the root, the DNA sits in the shaft, degraded into fragments under 100 base pairs, which most commercial extraction kits aren’t designed to capture. Mia Gale’s master’s research found a way to get it anyway. Mia is one […]
Introducing the 2026 ISHI Student Ambassadors: Daniel Arend
Daniel Arend has spent his PhD studying what happens to DNA during close-contact violence between people who know each other. How much transfers. Where it ends up. How long it persists. Daniel is one of five ISHI 2026 Student Ambassadors attending this year’s symposium in Providence, Rhode Island. The Student Ambassador Program gives emerging forensic […]
Analysis Software, AI Oversight, and a SANE-Led Panel: Three New Sessions at ISHI 2026
Analysis software makes algorithmic decisions that shape how DNA genotype data is interpreted. The AI tools entering forensic workflows require a type of oversight the field is still working out. And analysts who work sexual assault cases rarely hear the investigation described from every angle, including the survivor’s. Three new sessions at ISHI 37 address […]
Introducing the 2026 ISHI Student Ambassadors: Elizabeth Kowalcyzk
Not every forensic lab can afford the top-of-the-line sequencer. Elizabeth Kowalczyk is finding out what the less expensive ones can actually do. Elizabeth is one of five ISHI 37 Student Ambassadors attending this year’s symposium in Providence, Rhode Island. The Student Ambassador Program gives emerging forensic scientists a place at the table before most of […]
Introducing the 2026 ISHI Student Ambassadors: Xiaomeng (Simone) Yang
Dried whole blood. A saliva swab. From either sample, Simone Yang is working to estimate not just who was there, but their weight and build. Xiaomeng (Simone) Yang is one of five ISHI 37 Student Ambassadors attending this year’s symposium in Providence, Rhode Island. The Student Ambassador Program gives emerging forensic scientists a place at […]