A rapid and nondestructive approach for forensic identification of cigarette inner liner papers using shift-excitation Raman difference spectroscopy and chemometrics.

Abstract

In forensic science, cigarettes are considered as crucial physical evidence because it helps to establish the connection between the criminal and the crime scene. In the present study, SERDS has been used for the examination of 25 different brands or series of cigarette inner liner paper. The discrimination power is calculated by using three methods, i.e., visual discrimination of the spectra, hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) and principal component analysis (PCA). They are 100.00%, 92.42% and 100.00%, respectively. Cigarette inner liner paper samples were divided into four categories based on HCA and assignment of Raman special peaks: (1) talcum powder, (2) zinc oxide, (3) talcum powder and zinc oxide and (4) zinc oxide and barium sulfate. The PCA-FDA model was constructed for identifying the unknown samples, it delivered 100.00% calibration accuracy and validation accuracy. The results suggest that SERDS combined with the chemometric methods is a rapid, nondestructive and accurate method for the differentiation of cigarette inner liner papers.