Experiment

Identifying Fingerprints

Materials needed:

1. Printer's ink (preferably fast-drying and paste- like)
2. A sheet of glass
3. A soft rubber roller
4. A sheet of paper
5. A magnifying glass

Procedure:

1. Place a few drops of ink onto the glass inking plate and roll it to an even thin film on the surface.

2. Ink the fingers individually by "rolling" the first joint of each finger over the inked surface.

3. Now lightly press the inked part of the finger onto the paper, again by a slight rolling action.

4. Continue until you have produced ridge patterns of all 10 fingers.

5. Examine them with a magnify glass.

6. The Slides shown here will help you identify some of the formats of the fingerprints.