Comparison of glass fragments by neutron activation analysis

A method of comparing glass fragments of potential application to forensic sicence has been developed and evaluated. A representative sample of window glass from England and Wales has been collected and analysed for about 25 elements. An automated radiochemical separation followed by gamma-spectroscopy was used in order to determine the concentration of the maximum number of elements. Frequency distributions of the elemental concentration are shown and used to assess the discrimination of the technique and compare it with the measurement of refractive index. A few simulated cases have been included to demonstrate the possible application to forensic science problems.