• Online activities can help teach you about forensic science.Police image by Zeno from Fotolia.com
  
  With an ever-growing number of hit shows about crime scene investigation on television these days, more and more people are curious about the science of forensics. The Internet features many tutorials, lessons, games and other activities that can help someone of any age and interest level explore the fascinating history and science of forensics---without having to get up close and personal with gore.
  
  

Blood Spatter Analysis

• Blood spatter analysis requires basic trigonometry--and a strong stomach.blood donation image by robert mobley from Fotolia.com
  
  When a person is injured or killed, blood usually leaves the body. By examining the pattern of blood drips or spatters at the scene of a violent crime, experts can often determine a number of observations about the crime, such as the height at which the injury occurred, the weapon with which it was inflicted, the velocity of the weapon (in the case of a baseball bat or other blunt object), and the direction of the attack.
  
  Online tutorials give examples of how altering the velocity, angle or instrument of a blow will affect the resulting blood spatter. Some of these tutorials are graphic, so use caution.
  
  

History of Fingerprinting

• Every person's--and therefore every criminal's--fingerprint is unique.fingerprint image by dip from Fotolia.com
  
  Fingerprinting has a long, distinguished history as a tool of criminal investigation, offering a way to identify people who have touched objects associated with a crime scene. Online tutorials explicate the fascinating story of how it was discovered that every person has unique fingerprints and how the method of fingerprinting was developed. Tutorials can also teach you how to "dust for prints" and how partial fingerprints are matched with full fingerprints using the ridges and furrows that form the pattern of a print.
  
  A person who enjoys crime scene investigation shows might like this gift idea: a framed print of their fingerprints with the distinctive ridges and furrows marked.
  
  

Establishing Time of Death

• Flies gravitate toward decomposing bodies.gad-fly isect fly image by Pali A from Fotolia.com
  
  A vital element in establishing the time line of a crime involving a person's death is determining when that person died. Depending upon the manner and location of death, the weather conditions, the length of time that passed before the body was discovered, and a host of other factors, the time of death can be identified with remarkable accuracy. If you have an appetite for the macabre, browse an article describing how scientists can use the various stages of insect hatching that almost inevitably accompany a corpse's decomposition in order to establish the time of death.
  
  

Conducting an Autopsy

• An autopsy can reveal vital information about how a person died.operation in a process image by Andrey Kiselev from Fotolia.com
  
  If you've ever wondered how, exactly, an autopsy is conducted, the order in which the standard cuts are made, when the organs are weighed, and other things like that, you'll likely be fascinated by video tutorials that take you inside the gory world of forensic examination.