title: Advances in American forensic sciences. California's role.
abstract: The forensic sciences in the United States, specifically forensic medicine, have benefited primarily from the advances made by the New York Medical Examiner Office pioneers and the philosophy developed in the Massachusetts medicolegal structure as begun in 1877. California's pioneering role is directly related to the development of criminalistics which in turn served as a stimulus for the improvement and development of forensic medicine in that state. Historically many private practitioners were involved in general criminalistics in California before the system of state criminalistic laboratories and criminal investigations was well established. Any report on the growth of the forensic sciences must include mention of the earlier pioneers including Heinrich, Kirk, Kytka, Crossman, Abernethy, Pinker, Helsel, and Noxley. A review of the current state of the art in the forensic sciences is presented, as is a review of the contributions of California to the development of American forensic sciences.
mesh_terms: D002140:California; D005553:Forensic Dentistry / Q000266:history; D005554:Forensic Medicine / Q000193:education / Q000266:history*; D005555:Forensic Psychiatry / Q000266:history; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D007753:Laboratories; D012955:Societies, Medical