Forensic analysis of black, blue, red, and green ballpoint pen inks
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Date Uploaded:
26 November 2022
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Ballpoint pen inks (24 black, 18 blue, 21 red and 15 green) purchased in
Mauritius were analyzed by 5 different methods, namely thin layer chromatography
(TLC), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR), visible spectroscopy (VIS), filtered light
examination (FLE) and Raman spectroscopy (Raman). The results of the different
colored ballpoint pen inks obtained by the above techniques were compared in terms
of their discriminating power (D.P.). The results showed that the non-destructive
technique FLE was found to be the one with the highest D.P. (0.94–0.99) for the
black, red and green ballpoint pen inks whereas for the blue ballpoint pen inks,
highest D.P. was achieved using TLC. Higher D.P. were obtained for red, green,
black and blue ballpoint inks by FLE and TLC compared to the other methods such
as VIS, FTIR and Raman, showing the lower effectiveness of the latter for ink
analysis. Improvement in discrimination could be obtained by combining different
methods of analysis. Hence, by applying FLE, TLC and FTIR spectroscopy, all the
24 black ballpoint pen inks were successfully discriminated, whilst for the blue
ballpoint pen inks, the combination of two methods (FLE and TLC) resulted in a
discriminating power of 0.99. Only one pair of pens from the same
brand/manufacturer Cello could not be discriminated. On the other hand, the study
has also shown that by combining FLE with TLC, all the 21 red and 15 green
ballpoint pen inks were successfully discriminated, except for two pairs of red pens
and one pair of green pens.
