Tucked behind the rolling hills of George Mason University’s Science and Technology Campus in Prince William County, Va., forensic science students and professors meticulously tend to a five-acre forest. They plant flowers and maintain a cloister of beehives. Trees tower over the local wildlife, and a slatted chain-link fence keeps people from encroaching onto the natural sanctuary.But this is no ordinary nature preserve.
For example, O’Toole said, investigators often have trouble extracting good DNA samples from degrading skeletal remains. The farm will have a bone laboratory with bones from every donor to help researchers make comparisons and improve the quality of DNA taken from skeletons found outside of their controlled setting.
“We're trying to define the chemicals that are uniquely human,” Eckenrode said. “How can we differentiate animals and other things decomposing and the chemistry that is uniquely human? The uniqueness of a human being decomposing — that chemistry set, that list — is not yet formulated.”farm became operational in 2021, but has yet to get its first body.