Making the Case for Forensic Entomology as a Fulfilling Career

WEST LAFAYETTE, Indiana — Remember that crime scene investigation show you watched where the crime, evidence collection, autopsy report, trial and jury verdict were solved in a one-hour timespan? While that might be portrayed on television as reality, forensic entomologist Krystal Hans said those scenarios are few and far in between for real life forensic scientists.

Hans, assistant professor of forensic entomology at Purdue University’s Department of Entomology, said on her first day of class with her students, she begins by having conversations on the perception of crime and forensic science in the media based on the “crime dramas they watch.”

“One of the questions that I ask students is, ‘Who here can name an American serial killer?’ and almost every hand in the room goes up,” Hans said. “Then I ask, ‘Who here can name the victims of the serial killers?’ and no one answers.”

Hans said the perspective given on crime shows are normally ones of the perpetrator, with little understanding and impact on the victims and families themselves.

“I try to incorporate discussions to get my students to think about the human side of it,” she said. “The media perception that everything happens right away and the case will be solved within a few hours, it’s not just students who have that perception. Insects don’t work in a couple-day timespan.”

Hans said the time-frame forensic entomologist have to gather enough evidence for law enforcement is determined by several different factors, like the development of insects, their timeline of colonization, temperature data and more, which in turn does not guarantee a few-day turnaround.

One positive development that has come from the rise in popularity of television crime shows has been students gaining an interest in forensic science and crime-related fields .

“They’ve seen a forensic anthropologist because they’ve watched ‘Bones,’ and now they think this is what  want to do,” she said.

A CHILDHOOD DREAM

Hans sparked an interest in decomposed insects and outdoor creatures at a young age and hasn’t stopped working with them since.

Considering her allergies to animals with fur and feathers, her mother allowed her to bring insects and arthropods into the house as pets, Hans said.

© Krystal Hans

“As a kid, I did not know this career path existed,” she said. “I was always outside exploring and my grandmother owned property so I spent a lot of time out in the woods and just appreciating nature and insects.”

By the age of five, she wanted to become an Egyptologist from her fascination with mumification. Not knowing where that career path would take her, she decided to earn her undergraduate degree in pre-medicine, and assumed working in a hospital or nursing home were her only options.

“I volunteered at a hospital. The people were nice, but I was just miserable, it wasn’t the right fit and I thought that was my only option,” she said. “One of my friends was like, ‘There’s a forensic science symposium on campus,’ and I didn’t know anything about it but it sounded interesting.”

In that moment, Hans knew what she was destined to do with her career.

Taking a gap year after graduation, Hans spent that time working and figuring out the next steps toward a master’s degree.

“I ended up at Cleveland State University, and when I was there, I worked with a forensic entomologist and that was when I started working on casework and research projects,” Hans said. “Within the first couple months I knew this was definitely for me.”

She said the forensic entomologist field across North American is very selective, with only 15 women who’ve completed the American Board of Forensic Entomology (ABFE) and eight men.

With this in mind, she knew choosing the right program to earn her doctorate degree required some research and time to make the right decision.

Hans attended the University of Windsor in Ontario, Canada in 2011 and completed her doctorate degree in 2016. Two months later, she started her first teaching job at Delaware State University as an assistant professor in their forensic biology program.

In 2019, a position opened up at Purdue University for a full-time lecturing position in the department of entomology. Hans decided to jump on the opportunity to further her research and teaching career.

‘COMPARTMENTALIZING’ AND PROCESSING A CRIME SCENE

Hans currently studies and researches the application of insects to homicides, suicides and sometimes cases of neglect or abuse where children or elderly are abused or neglected in the home, she said.

“Flies arrive relatively quickly after death, and once they lay their eggs and hatch into maggots, those insects are feeding on the [person’s] tissue,” Hans said. “I get on the scene, I collect those insects, figure out what species they are and work backwards in time from when the eggs were laid and find a time of colonization that insects have been active on the body.”

Hans said luckily for her, she is normally the “last responder” on a scene so she does not interact with any witnesses or family members.

“I wouldn’t want [family members] to have to watch me collect the insects off the body,” she said. “I have had disturbing cases like juvenile or child cases, and those are always more difficult. Trying to provide the timeline information to give to the family is really important to me.”

When Hans is on the scene, she said she can’t think about “all of the network of people that loved that victim.”

“That will completely distract me and I can’t think about them from that standpoint,” Hans said. “I have to try and compartmentalize while I’m collecting research and I’m very focused in the field. Once I start thinking about families, that’s incredibly distracting.”

A GROWING FIELD OF ENTOMOLOGY

Hans said her workload is currently divided 70 percent teaching at Purdue, and 30 percent in-field research and autopsy studies.

“During the [academic] year, my days are mostly focused on prepping for teaching, being in lecture [classes] and [working with] my graduate teaching assistants,” she said. “I am currently in ‘decomposition season,’ so in the summer, I spend more time at crime seasons, autopsies, working on evidence in the lab and training law enforcement.”

© Krystal Hans

Hans has seen tremendous growth in the field over the last few years, with every academic year more students wanting to learn about forensic science.

“Every year I get requests to increase the enrollment in my classes,” she said. “One class started at 50 students, now it’s at 120.”

Hans’ approach to mentorship and training her students allows for hands-on experiences in the field alongside her.

“My graduate students attend autopsies to collect evidence and help me process things in the lab, [and help with] identification of insects and we are building a database of forensically relevant insects from human remains,” she said. “It gives them that experience and I trust they’re going to collect what they need to.”

Hans, along with faculty members from Arizona State University, started the Cold Case Symposium in 2022, to help families in need of support with cold cases across the U.S.

“I started cold case research projects with my students two years ago, and we had been working on cold cases, pulling information and visual displays to raise awareness about a cold case,” she said. “I saw there was a big need for a community of people to support the families.”

Hans said the goal of the first Cold Case Symposium in September 2022 was a way for the two universities to bring students, community members and families of cold cases together to offer resources from different organizations, and speakers to share their experiences. 

“This is a new way to get this network of people together,” she said. “This year, the Cold Case Symposium is on Oct. 12 at Purdue and I’ve been working with Project Cold Case to bring a list of speakers and organizations to the event.”