Wednesday, August 10, 2005

Crime Lab

The forensics team took a tour of the Wisconsin crime lab, very cool. The building looks old and run down from the outside, but inside it looks much newer and has nice high skylights. This seems to be a pattern with government buildings - rough on the outside, nice on the inside. Mike Camp walked us around. The rooms each had a large window revealing different workers, microscopes, walls of pistols/machine guns/sniper rifles, blown up pictures of DNA code, finger print patterns and anything else you imagine in an exciting episode of CSI. Each stop was another step in the investigative process. One room had a woman analyzing documents by analyzing the specific style of the writer, another room had people busy under ventilation hoods and a sign explaining how different drugs kill different parts of your body. I found myself remembering the principles of biochemistry from my first year of medical school. I also found myself thinking that I want to help people in a way that effects a population. Maybe in Emergency medicine I will do research on gun control or drug use. Maybe I will identify intersections where my patients get in accidents, or maybe look at car designs that better protect passengers. Sounds like fun.

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