News

ISFG Summer School | Virtual Edition 2025

The virtual 2025 Summer School will take place between August 25 and September 5, 2025. Save the dates! More information will be available soon.

The first Newsletter for 2025 is out!

For important information about our society and all the news regarding recent ISFG and working group activities, please read the March 2025 Newsletter here

International Summer Course 2025 – Copenhagen University

The Department of Forensic Medicine of the University of Copenhagen is hosting another edition of the Summer Course on Forensic Genetics and Massively Parallel Sequencing. This is a great opportunity to learn how to carry out analysis of DNA in forensic genetics using MPS. For more detailed information, visit the website and/or send an email to ForensicGeneticsCourse@sund.ku.dk. Applications are open until April 1st, 2025.

The new ISFG Executive Committee

During the recent General Assembly meeting in Santiago de Compostela, where the ISFG2024 congress was held, election of the Executive Committee members took place and their roles are now functioning, from January 2025 onwards. Meet the new Board members here

Happy New Year!

Wishing you all a New Year full of successful experiments! ❤️

NIST Publishes Report on DNA Mixture Interpretation Methods

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has published DNA Mixture Interpretation: A Scientific Foundation Review. This report reviews the methods that forensic laboratories use to interpret evidence containing a mixture of DNA from two or more people. The new version considers several studies published since the draft report was released in 2021 and includes updated data from DNA analyst proficiency tests and other sources. The preface of the report contains a list of significant revisions.

Happy Holidays! The December 2024 Newsletter is out!

For important information about our society and all the news regarding recent ISFG and working group activities, please read the December 2024 Newsletter here

STRAF - New version available

STRAF (STR Analysis for Forensics) has been used in the past years for over 200 population genetic studies worldwide for quality control and analysis of population genetics parameters. It's an STR data analysis application and a new version of STRAF, with improvements and new features, is now available here This website and others with relevance for forensic genetics may also be accessed via our Links webpage

GHEP-OS | 2nd Edition Online School in March 2025

The GHEP Online School (GHEP-OS) is an educational event organized by the Spanish and Portuguese speaking (GHEP) working group of the ISFG, which takes place twice a year. The workshops are organized in order to span a 3 to 4-week interval with up to 4-hour sessions taking place once a week. The GHEP-OS Spring 2025 edition, to be held in March 2025, includes the following topics: X-chromosomal markers in forensic genetics (Daniel Kling & Andreas Tillmar – in English); Accreditation & validation in forensic genetics (Manuel Crespillo Márquez, Rosalía Izquierdo & Estel Enreig Cabanes - in Spanish); DVI (Carlos Vullo & Lourdes Prieto – in Spanish). Registrations will be open to the general public on January 16, 2025. Since seats are limited, GHEP-ISFG members have a priority registration period until January 15, 2025. Please visit the GHEP-ISFG website with more details here

Essentials of DNA Interpretation - short course - New edition

From January 2025 to January 2026 (around 150 hours training, 5 ECTS), the Essentials of DNA Interpretation course, organised by the Faculty of Law, Criminal Justice and Public Administration, University of Lausanne in Switzerland, will take place online. The aim is to enable practitioners to address challenging DNA casework, explain their reasoning in court and feel at ease with expert debate and published literature on DNA interpretation. It's a 12-month course with a 4-hour workload per week. Registration deadline: November 29, 2024. For more information click here

Read all about it! The September 2024 Newsletter is out!

For important information about our society and all the news regarding the recent 2024 Congress in Santiago de Compostela, please read the September 2024 Newsletter here

NIST Publication | Strategic Opportunities to Advance Forensic Science in the US

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has published Strategic Opportunities to Advance Forensic Science in the United States: A Path Forward Through Research and Standards, which identifies four “grand challenges” facing the forensic science community in the United States. While the focus of this report, and two others released earlier this year, is on the United States, the scientific issues are universal and may be applicable to other countries. You may access the 50-page report here More detailed information on this subject is available at the NIST website here Furthermore, you may read more about the NIST’s Forensic Science Program which works to strengthen the scientific basis of forensic methods and practices so that evidence is appropriately collected, accurately analyzed, and effectively communicated.

New call for Peter M. Schneider ISFG Fellowships, 2024

The ISFG is offering up to 10 short-term travel fellowships for scientists to support transnational exchange visits between collaborating research groups for specific projects related to forensic genetics. More info here

Our June 2024 Newsletter is out!

For updates and important information about our society, please read the June 2024 Newsletter here

1st International meeting on Sudden Cardiac Death in the Balkan area

The 1st International meeting on “Sudden Cardiac Death in the Balkan area: beyond what we know and directions for the future research” will be held in Trieste, Italy, on October 11, 2024. The meeting is aimed at all health professionals in the Balkan and mediterranean areas involved with sudden cardiac death and will be opened with a lectio magistralis by Prof. Mary Noelle Sheppard, a renowned cardiopathologist in St George Hospital in London and past president of the Association of Cardiovascular Pathology and co-author of the guidelines for pathologists for the study of sudden cardiac death. The working day will continue with three round tables of pathologists, geneticists and cardiologists from Italy, Slovenia, Macedonia, Serbia, Croatia, Greece, Czech Republic and Turkey who addressed their focus on sudden cardiac death from a morphological, diagnostic, clinical and prevention point of view. This event will count on the presence of highly authoritative internationally renowned speakers and aims to lay the foundations for consolidating collaboration with neighboring countries of the Balkan area and identifying common research projects to prevent sudden and unexpected fatal events and to protect citizen’s health. Registration is free via internationalmeetingscd@gmail.com

GeFI – New Recommendations - Sexual Violence Working Group

The revision of the updated recommendations on the collection of biological specimens for forensic genetic testing in the medical legal care of victims of sexual violence and/or abuse, is in progress. Please read the document here. The GeFI group is inviting anyone who may wish to contribute to the revision of this document, by sending their comments to the Coordinator of the Sexual Violence Working Group, Susi Pelotti at susi.pelotti@unibo.it

First Report by the Forensic Databases Advisory Board (FDAB) – Revised version, September 2023

This first report of the Forensic Databases Advisory Board (FDAB) aims to provide the International Society for Forensic Genetics (ISFG) with a framework to assess the ethical implications of hosting data from a variety of population groups on the forensic genetic frequency databases (FGFD) known as Y-chromosome Haplotype Reference Database (YHRD), the EDNAP Mitochondrial DNA Population Database (EMPOP) and the STRs for Identity ENFSI Reference Database (STRidER). Ethical considerations in this report include questions of data acquisition, data sensitivity and identifiability and ethical principles to be implemented. The report (v.September 2023) is available here Many thanks to the FDAB team for their efforts in creating and improving this very important document!

PMS Forensic Genetics Facebook Group

Historically, a Facebook Group was founded in 2012 by our dear friend and colleague Prof. Dr. Peter M. Schneider (1955-2022), a mentor and role model in the field of Forensic Genetics. He opened it under the acronym EUROFORGEN in response to a request from the European Union that suggested research activities from EU-funded projects should also be disseminated on social media. After completing the EUROFORGEN project in 2017, Peter continued to curate this community site, which has now reached a significant size and contains various posts relevant to the forensic genetics’ community. Peter was also a long-time member of the executive board of the International Society for Forensic Genetics. As board members, we have often discussed the use of social media to support communication between forensic geneticists and stakeholders. As a result, ISFG has “gone social” and now offers curated accounts on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and X to educate members on topics relevant to our society. In addition, the ISFG board discussed setting up a more flexible community website to also give members the opportunity to contribute, but decided against it because the EUROFORGEN community website already existed and we did not want to create redundancy or competition. The ISFG board has decided to continue Peter's work and assume responsibility for this group and the website under the new acronym PMS-Forensic-Genetics. It was very important to Peter to support young scientists and he was actively involved in networking, training and continued education. Our goal is to maintain and curate this community page to honor Peter's tireless work. We invite contributions relevant to this field of research and practice.

Peter M. Schneider Tributes

All the tribute messages in memory of Peter Schneider collected during the Summer School 2023 have been published as an online book and is accessible to all. The ISFG Board has created a new page on the website with the online book and everything written and done as a tribute to our beloved Peter. Please visit this new section here

New Proficiency Test from the Arabic Speaking WG!!

The proficiency testing scheme is jointly provided by the Institute for Forensic Molecular Genetics (IFMG) & Dubai Police International Center for Forensic Sciences (ICFS, https://icfs.ac.ae/). As this testing scheme is being introduced for the first time, we are delighted to inform laboratories that the PT (available in English) is open to all laboratories and that there are no costs associated with participating in it. Please visit IDNAP ASWG PT 2023 Guidelines. Those interested in participating may register via the Google Forms page https://forms.gle/2doJm43AWCq4Sken6.

Essentials of DNA Interpretation - short course

From January 2024 to January 2025 (around 150 hours training, 5 ECTS), the Essentials of DNA Interpretation course, organised by the Faculty of Law, Criminal Justice and Public Administration, University of Lausanne in Switzerland, will take place online. The aim is to enable practitioners to address challenging DNA casework, explain their reasoning in court and feel at ease with expert debate and published literature on DNA interpretation. For more information click here

New DNA Commission recommendations

The DNA Commission of the ISFG has just released the recommendations on Short Tandem Repeat sequence nomenclature! A lot of work and time was put into these very important and useful issues for the forensic genetics community, so congratulations to all the experts involved in this work! Gettings KB., Bodner M., Borsuk LA., King JL., Ballard D., Parson W., Benschop CCG., Børsting C., Budowle B., Butler JM., Van D., Gill P., Gusmão L., Hares DR., Hoogenboom J., Irwin J., Prieto L., Schneider PM., Vennemann M., Phillips C. (2023), 'Recommendations of the DNA Commission of the International Society for Forensic Genetics (ISFG) on Short Tandem Repeat sequence nomenclature', Forensic Science International: Genetics -, in press (Gettings et al. 2023)

Snipper App Suite | New version

A new version of the Snipper App Suite (http://mathgene.usc.es/snipper/) is now available (September 2023). The new version offers a bundle of new tools, which are summarised on http://mathgene.usc.es/snipper/version_history.html. Many thanks to the Snipper team for maintaining and improving these very useful tools! Please consult the link https://www.isfg.org/Software for more information about many other free softwares

Workshop Recordings | ISFG Summer School 2023

The recordings of the 19 ISFG Summer School 2023 workshops, which are now running live, will be available on-demand. Visit the new website, choose your workshop recording(s) and view them between October 2 and 22, 2023. Registrations are from September 15 to 29, 2023.

Peter M. Schneider Tribute

As part of the 2023 virtual edition of the ISFG Summer School, a 1-hour online tribute session on August 28 at 10 am (CEST), open to everyone, will be taking place to honour our colleague and friend, Peter M. Schneider. You may connect to this session on ZOOM via the following link You may join at any time between 10:00 and 11:00 am (CEST). Read more on the 2023 Summer School tribute page

New EMBO Member - Manfred Kayser

We are very proud that Manfred Kayser, Professor at Erasmus MC, University Medical Center Rotterdam, Head of Department of Genetic Identification and active ISFG member, has been elected as Member of EMBO! Congratulations on this major achievement!

First Report by the Forensic Databases Advisory Board (FDAB)

This first report of the Forensic Databases Advisory Board (FDAB) aims to provide the International Society for Forensic Genetics (ISFG) with a framework to assess the ethical implications of hosting data from a variety of population groups on the forensic genetic frequency databases (FGFD) known as Y-chromosome Haplotype Reference Database (YHRD), the EDNAP Mitochondrial DNA Population Database (EMPOP) and the STRs for Identity ENFSI Reference Database (STRidER). Ethical considerations in this report include questions of data acquisition, data sensitivity and identifiability and ethical principles to be implemented. The document is available here The presentation of the report at the 12th Haploid Markers meeting in Budapest, Hungary, May 18th 2023, is available here Many thanks to the FDAB team for their efforts in creating and improving this very important document! Feedback and comments are welcome through fdab@uwc.ac.za When submitting comments, please use "FDAB 1st Report - Feedback " in the subject. If possible, try to structure your feedback in clear sections like Problem Statement and Proposed Solution. The comments received in this email address will be made public as a consultation document. Comments will be collected until May 30. The submissions will be compiled and published with name and affiliation, unless the preference for anonymity is indicated.

ISFG Summer School 2023

In order to provide an interesting set of workshops for the 2023 online ISFG Summer School, a survey was carried out and the results obtained from over 170 responses are summarized here Thank you for your contributions! The virtual 2023 Summer School will take place between August 28 and September 8, 2023. Visit the website and register!

The ISFG is on Social Media!

You can now follow the ISFG on your favorite social media platforms. Find us at: Linkedin ISFG - International Society for Forensic Genetics https://www.linkedin.com/company/isfg-international-society-for-forensic-genetics Facebook @isfg https://www.facebook.com/isfg.official Instagram isfg_{forensicgenetics} https://www.instagram.com/isfg_forensicgenetics/ Twitter @ISFG_forgen https://twitter.com/ISFG_forgen

New versions of EuroForMix and CaseSolver

Øyvind Bleka (Department of Forensic Sciences, Oslo University Hospital) has updated EFM and CS. The newest version of EFM is euroformix_4.0.1 (compatible with R v4.2.x). Please visit http://www.euroformix.com/?q=about to download the zip file. Some of the new features of this version are: better speed, better functionalities for Bayesian based LR, new GUI layouts and new functions which simplify terminal interface. The newest version of CS is casesolver_2.0.0 (compatible with R v4.2.x, requires EFM v4.0.1 to run). Please visit http://www.euroformix.com/?q=casesolver to download the zip file. The main advantages of this version are: faster qualitative and quantitative calculations, and more information on conservative LR calculations, but there are other interesting new features (for instance, IBS calculations now also show the number of mismatches, the user can modify the MatchStatus of any evidence profile, verbal statement for reporting is now only up to a certain LR threshold) Many thanks to the EFM team for maintaining and improving these very useful tools! Please consult the link https://www.isfg.org/Software for more information about many other software

ISFG Summer School 2023

In order to provide an interesting set of workshops for the 2023 online ISFG Summer School it would be extremely useful if you can provide us with information on your interests and suggestions. We therefore would be thankful if you can answer a few questions through the following link: ISFG Summer School 2023 - Workshop survey. With your answers and the feedback from last summer school we hope to define an interesting program that meets the needs and expectations of the colleagues from our field.

Passing of Peter Schneider

It is with great sadness that we announce the unfortunate passing of our friend and colleague Peter M. Schneider of Cologne, Germany. Peter greeted everyone with kind words and was a dear friend to many throughout our international community. He has been the heart and soul of the International Society for Forensic Genetics for the past quarter century and served in almost every role as a dedicated ISFG Board member, most recently as secretary. In spite of chronic illness for the past two decades, he continued to give his all in service to others. Multiple European consortium and multi-center grants, such as SNPforID, EuroForGen, and VISAGE, owe their existence to his persistence and scientific leadership. We will miss him, his wisdom, and his insights. May we honor him by going forward and seeking to share our friendship and fellowship with each other as he has done and would like us to continue to do.

SallyAnn Harbison was elected to the New Zealand Royal Society

Together with 22 colleagues, SallyAnn Harbison, Institute of Environmental Science and Research Ltd (ESR) and University of Auckland, has been elected to the Academy of the Royal Society Te Apārangi for her distinction in research and advancement of mātauranga Māori, humanities, technology and science. She is among the world leaders in her area of research and scholarship. For details of her achievements, please see this Link to the Royal Society of New Zealand.

Impact factor for FSI Genetics reinstated for 2020

The impact factor for our society journal Forensic Science International: Genetics, which had been suppressed from the journal citation report last year, see Clarivate suppression, has been reinstated by Clarivate for 2020. In the new edition of the report, the IF is now at 4.882, and FSI Genetics is again at the top of the category "Medicine, legal" (click on image for details).

New DNA phenotyping page

Forensic DNA Phenotyping (FDP) comprises DNA-based predictions of human appearance traits, biogeographic ancestry, and age. We have created a new page listing online resources and web tools that can be used to make predictions.

Congress proceedings from ISFG 2019 in Prague online

The proceedings from the 28^th ISFG Congress in Prague 2019 have been published in Vol. 7 of the Forensic Science International: Genetics Supplement Series. They are avaliable online for all readers and the articles can be accessed freely. The publication of the proceedings has been paid for by our Society. The articles can be retrieved here: https://www.fsigeneticssup.com/issue/S1875-1768(19)X0002-5

No impact factor for FSI Genetics in 2019

Our society journal Forensic Science International: Genetics has been suppressed from the current "Journal Citation Report". Both the journal editors and the executive board are appealing this decision ­– please find a full documentation on this page!

ISFG 2019 conference proceedings available

A new volume of the FSI:Genetics Supplement Series containing extended abstracts for work presented at the 28^th International ISFG Congress in Prague 2019 is now available. The link was placed on our Publications page under Congress Proceedings. The publication of these articles has been funded by the ISFG and the articles are thus free of charge for all. Furthermore, the scientific prize lecture given by Manfred Kayser (Rotterdam) and four invited lectures have been uploaded to our website and made available to the ISFG members. Please visit our Education page in the Members' Area for viewing and downloading. Please note that you will have to sign in with user name and password to have access to this page!

Forensic Practitioner's Guide to the Interpretation of Complex DNA Profiles

A new textbook written by Peter Gill and his colleagues Øyvind Bleka, Oskar Hansson, Corina Benschop and Hinda Haned has been published by Academic Press in June 2020. The book begins with an introduction to basic forensic genetics. The laws of statistics are described, along with the likelihood ratio based on Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium and alternative models considering sub-structuring and relatedness. The historical development of low template mixture analysis, theory and practice, is also described, so the reader has a full understanding of rationale and progression. Evaluation of evidence and statement writing is described in detail, along with common pitfalls and their avoidance. Peter Gill has generously offered that all royalties from the book sales will be passed on the ISFG to fund educational events and fellowships for the members of our society - thank you, Peter! You find all further details about the book and how to purchase it on the Publisher's website.

50th Anniversary of the ISFG

In 2018, the ISFG has celebrated the 50^th anniversary of its existence, as well as the 30^th anniversary of the EDNAP group. You can find information about the history of the ISFG on our pages. In 2019, the ISFG has published a brochure to commemorate and celebrate the first 50 years of its existence. This brochure is available for downloading.

ISFG 2021 website updated!

The website of the 29^th ISFG Congress in Washington D.C. 2021 has been updated with new content, such as information about the programme and the venue, the Marriott Marquis Hotel in Downtown Washington. More content will now be added regularly, so please make sure to visit from time to time! http://www.isfg2021.org

ISFG General Assembly 2019 in Prague

During the 28^th ISFG Congress in Prague, Czech Republic, the General Assembly has elected John Butler (Gaithersburg, MD) as the new president of the society. Also, Leonor Gusmão (Rio de Janeiro) was elected as new Representative of the Working Parties, and Marielle Vennemann (Münster) was elected as new Treasurer of the ISFG. ­– Furthermore, the Assembly decided that Ate Kloosterman (Amsterdam) as well as Hermann Schmitter (Wiesbaden), two scientists who have been involved in the formation of the European DNA Profiling (EDNAP) Group 30 years age, will become Honorary Members of the ISFG. ­– As venue for the 30^th ISFG Congress in 2023, the city of Santiago de Compostela (Spain) was elected by the members of the assembly. With more than 1,000 participants, the 28^th ISFG Congress in Prague was the largest international congress ever organized by the ISFG. The executive board thanks Congress President Jiri Drabek for this great success.

2019 ISFG Science Prizes awarded

At the 28^th International ISFG Congress in Prague, the society has awarded two scientific prizes to two renowned colleagues during the General Assembly meeting on September 12°th, 2019. The prizes were handed over by ISFG president Walther Parson (Innsbruck). Christopher Phillips (Santiago de Compostela; left) received the prize for his work on developing ancestry informative marker sets and improving knowledge of forensic SNP and STR markers. Thore Egeland (Oslo; right) received the prize for his contributions to developing paternity statistics software and his enthusiasm in offering biostatistical training workshops.

ISFG 2019 in Prague has started

The 28^th International ISFG World Congress in Prague has started on September 9, 2019 with a 2-day workshop program. The congress will be opended on September 10 by the president, Jiri Drabek, and the ISFG president, Walther Parson. The ISFG prize winner, Manfred Kayser, will then give the inaugural lecture providing an overview on "10 years of forensic DNA pnenotyping research". We look forward to an exciting event!

2018 Impact Factor for FSI Genetics: 4.884

Elsevier, the publisher of our journal "Forensic Science International: Genetics" has just released information from Clarivate Analytics that the impact factor for 2018 is now at 4.884. After the extremely high 5.637 it had to be expected that the next IF would be considerably lower. Still, 4.884 represents the third highest IF in the history of FSI Genetics. This confirms the high recognition of the journal in our field. FSI Genetics continues to be the leading journal in the category "Medicine, Legal".

Old ISFH proceedings online for members

The first series of ISFH proceedings Advances in Forensic Haemogenetics Vols. 1 ­– 6, covering the international congresses in the years 1985-1995, have now been made available online for ISFG members. Please visit https://www.isfg.org/Publications/Advances in Forensic Haemogenetics and sign in as a member to get the tables of contents for all six volumes!

EMPOP4: Next Generation Forensic mtDNA Database

We are happy to announce the development and launch of the new search engine SAM2, https://empop.online; (Huber et al 2018: "Next generation database search algorithm for forensic mitogenome analyses"; http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.fsigen.2018.09.001). SAM2 performs database searches in unaligned nucleotide string format and provides phylogenetic alignment and haplogroup estimates of mitotypes.

2017 Impact Factor for FSI Genetics: 5.637

Elsevier, the publisher of our journal "Forensic Science International: Genetics" has just released information from Clarivate Analytics that the impact factor for 2017 has jumped from 3.911 to an unprecedented 5.637, the highest value ever obtained by a forensic journal in this field! The details are shown in the figure above and document the excellent quality of our journal. FSI Genetics continues to be the leading journal in the category "Medicine, Legal". Furthermore, FSI Genetics now ranks at position 21 among 171 journals in the category "Genetics" which is also quite extraordinary!

ISFG 2017 conference proceedings available

A new volume of the FSI:Genetics Supplement series containing extended abstracts for work presented at the 27^th International ISFG Congress in Seoul 2017 is now available. The link was placed on our Publications page under Congress Proceedings. These articles are free of charge for all.

ISFG 2017 presentations online

More than 35 plenary lectures and workshop presentations given at the 27^th International ISFG Congress in Seoul 2017 have been uploaded to our website and made available to the ISFG members. Please visit our Education page in the Members' Area for viewing and downloading. Please note that you will have to sign in with user name and password to have access to the page!

ISFG Prize awarded to Manfred Kayser

The scientific prize of the ISFG 2017 has been awarded to Professor Manfred Kayser from Erasmus University Medical Center Rotterdam. The award was announced during the 27^th International ISFG Congress in Seoul. Manfred Kayser receives the award for his groundbreaking work related to forensic DNA phenotyping and haploid markers. He will give the inaugural lecture in 2019 at the 28^th International ISFG Congress in Prague.

ISFG 2017 in Seoul has started!

The 27^th International ISFG Congress in Seoul, South Korea, has started on August 29^th 2017. More than 540 abstracts have ben submitted, and approx. 700 participants from more than 65 countries are present. The Local Organizing Committee has done an excellent job to ensure a smooth organization of this conference taking place in the large COEX centre. For further details, see http://www.isfg2017.org.

ISFG 2017 Seoul: Mobile Conference App!

The ISFG congress 2017 is going digital: a mobile app has been created by the organizing committee to keep track of the schedule, and to allow live questions from the auditorium after the oral presentations!

1. Visit the URL on your device: http://guidebook.com/app/ISFG2017/
2. Tap the ‘Download’ button to get the free app
3. Open the app and log in

X-STR guidelines published by ISFG DNA Commission

The ISFG DNA Commission has published guidelines and recommendations on the use of X-STR markers. Linkage and linkage disequilibrium (association of alleles) are of special importance for such evaluations and these concepts and the implications for likelihood calculations are described in more detail. Furthermore it is important to use appropriate computer software that accounts for linkage and linkage disequilibrium among loci, as well as for mutations. The document can be retrieved from the ISFG DNA Commission publication list. Tillmar, A.O., Kling, D., Butler, J.M., Parson, W., Prinz, M., Schneider, P.M., Egeland, T., Gusmão, L. (2017), 'DNA Commission of the International Society for Forensic Genetics (ISFG): Guidelines on the use of X-STRs in kinship analysis.', Forensic Sci. Int. Genet. 29, 269-275

Forensic genetics research project VISAGE kicks off

The EU Horizon 2020 funded VISAGE Project was launched with its kick-off meeting on May 30/31 2017 at the Erasmus University Medical Center Rotterdam, The Netherlands. The VISible Attributes Through GEnomics (VISAGE) Consortium will establish new scientific knowledge, develop prototype tools, validate and implement them into forensic practice, to predict a person’s appearance, age, and ancestry from DNA traces. The outcome will help focusing police investigations to find unknown perpetrators more rapidly and effectively via DNA-based intelligence information obtained from crime scenes. For further information see the Press release from Erasmus MC and to keep up to date with the VISAGE project visit: http://www.visage-h2020.eu

Making Sense of Forensic Genetics

The EUROFORGEN Network of Excellence has published in collaboration with the UK charity Sense about Science a guide for the wider public, the police and judiciary on "Making Sense of Forensic Genetics". The 38-page booklet is available for downloading here: http://senseaboutscience.org/activities/making-sense-of-forensic-genetics/ This guide shares what DNA analysis can currently do in the criminal justice system, what its limitations are, and what might be possible in the future. It includes graphics and real-life cases where DNA evidence has been a game changer in investigations as well as where its misuse has led to miscarriages of justice. The authors hope this guide will be a useful resource to anyone who works with, or crosses paths with DNA evidence in the criminal justice system.

DNA Commission on software validation

The ISFG DNA Commission has published Recommendations on the validation of software programs performing biostatistical calculations for forensic genetics applications. Recommendations for the software provider address, for example, the documentation of the underlying models used by the software, validation data expectations, version control, implementation and training support, as well as continuity and user notifications. For the internal validations the recommendations include: creating a validation plan, requirements for the range of samples to be tested, Standard Operating Procedure development, and internal laboratory training and education. To ensure that all laboratories have access to a wide range of samples for validation and training purposes the ISFG DNA commission encourages collaborative studies and public repositories of STR typing results. The document can be retrieved from the ISFG DNA Commission publication list.

Discount for Open Access publication in FSI: Genetics

FSI: Genetics offers the option to buy "Open Access" for published articles, to make them freely available to both subscribers and the wider public. There is a 20% discount off the open access publication fee for members of the ISFG. For furter details, see the open access information for authors. You can identify yourself as a society member during the article submission process by providing your ISFG membership number (displayed on your personal profile page).

Proceedings from the 26^th ISFG Congress in Krakow published

The presentations of the 26^th ISFG congress have been published in Vol. 5 of the Forensic Science International: Genetics Supplement Series. The proceedings are now available free of charge due to funding by the congress organizers and the ISFG. You find links to all previously published congress proceedings here: Publications/Congress Proceedings.

ISFG prize lecture video online

The recipient of the Scientific Prize of the ISFG 2013, Peter Gill, has prepared a video displaying the commented slides of of his prize lecture on the "Origins of modern forensic genetics" held at the 26^th ISFG Congress in Kraków. The video can be retrieved from our webpage on the ISFG Scientific Prize. For online watching, you might need a browser plugin, such as e.g. the VLC media player

ISFG 2015 Workshop presentations online

The presentations of the ISFG 2015 pre-congress educational workshops have been made available online for ISFG members. We are grateful to all workshop presenters who have shared their data. Please sign in and visit the "Education Members Area/Education

Scientific Prize of ISFG 2015 awarded to T. Parsons

At the 26^th ISFG Congress in Kraków in September 2015, the Scientific Prize of ISFG 2015 was awarded to Dr. Thomas J. Parsons. He is the Director of the Forensic Science Department of the International Commission of Missing Persons (ICMP). He received the award from the ISFG President, Dr. Mecki Prinz, for his work related to human mitochondrial DNA analysis and the identification of victims of war and disaster.

ISFG General Assembly 2015 in Kraków

During the 26^th ISFG Congress in Kraków, Poland, the General Assembly has elected Walther Parson (Innsbruck) as the new president of the society. Also, John Butler (Gaithersburg, MD) was elected as new Representative of the Working Parties, and Leonor Gusmão (Rio de Janeiro) was reelected as Treasurer of the ISFG. Furthermore, the Assembly decided that Wolfgang R. Mayr (Vienna), the former secretary of the ISFG, and president of the two ISFG congresses in Vienna 1987 and 2011, as well as George Sensabaugh (Berkeley, CA), the president of the ISFG congress 1999 in San Francisco, will become Honorary Members of the ISFG. As venue for the 28^th ISFG Congress in 2019, the city of Prague (Czech Republic) was elected by the members of the assembly.

ISFG 2015 in Kraków

The 26^th ISFG Congress has been kicked off successfully on Sept. 1^st, 2015, in Kraków, Poland. It is the largest international ISFG congress ever with more than 700 participants from all over the world. Follow us on Facebook under #isfg2015

The ISFG has a Wikipedia page

A new page describing the International Society for Forensic Genetics has been created and recently accepted in the popular WIKIPEDIA Encyclopedia. Furthermore, the category Forensic Genetics has been established under Forensics to link all relevant pages for this topic. All ISFG members and users familiar with creating and editing Wikipedia pages are kindly invited to connect additional relevant pages and to scrutinize the quality and content of all Wikipedia pages related to this category.

2014 Impact Factor for FSI Genetics: 4.604

Elsevier, the publisher of our journal "Forensic Science International: Genetics" has just released information from Thomson Reuters that the impact factor for 2014 has jumped from 3.202 to an unprecedented 4.604, the highest value ever obtained by a forensic journal in this field! The details are shown in the figure above and document the excellent quality of our journal. FSI Genetics is again the leading journal in the category "Medicine, Legal". Furthermore, FSI Genetics now ranks at position 33 among 157 journals in the category "Genetics" which is quite extraordinary!

Obituary for Professor Konrad Hummel

Professor Konrad Hummel has passed away on December 30^th, 2014, at the age of 91. He was the last living founding member of the ISFG. Konrad Hummel was a highly recognized scientist in particular in the German-speaking countries due to his contributions in the field of population genetics and biostatistics for paternity and relationship testing at a time when such cases could only be analyzed using blood group serology and protein polymorphisms. In the 1960ies, he collaborated with the statistician Peter Ihm for developing a general algorithm for kinship analysis. However, his concept of using equal prior probabilities to "simplify" the Essen-Möller formula that helped to standardize paternity calculations in many European countries was also critically commented by fellow scientists. The Executive Board of the ISFG has published an obituary in German language on January 10^th, 2015, in his home town Freiburg in the Badische Zeitung Furthermore, FSI Genetics has published an obituary for Konrad Hummel. with more details about his academic and private life.

ICMP Established as International Organization

The Foreign Ministers of the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Belgium, and Luxembourg have signed a Framework Agreement on December 15, 2014, that grants a new legal status to the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP). The Framework Agreement stipulates that ICMP will establish its Headquarters in The Hague, where it will be close to other international organizations in the justice and rule of law field. This move, which is subject to further administrative and legal arrangements, is expected to take place during 2015.

GHEP-ISFG Working Group Received Accreditation for Proficiency Exercise

The basic level of the Proficiency Exercise 'Analysis of DNA polymorphisms in bloodstains and other biological samples' annually organized by the GHEP-ISFG and coordinated by the Quality Assurance Service at the Madrid Department of the National Institute of Toxicology and Forensic Sciences (Ministry of Justice, Spain) received accreditation by the Spanish National Accreditation body (ENAC) under the standard ISO/IEC 17043:2010. We are very grateful to the Excercise Coordinator, Koro Fernández, to the previous Coordinator, Josefina Gómez, and to all the staff involved for their excellent work and endeavour which have made this achievement possible.

ISFG Scientific Prize awarded to Peter Gill

At the General Assembly of the ISFG members in Melbourne (September 4, 2013) during the 25^th ISFG World Congress, the president M. Prinz announced that the Scientific Prize of the ISFG will be awarded to Professor Peter Gill (Oslo, Norway, formerly Glasgow and Birmingham, UK) for his outstanding contributions to the scientific development of STR technology. As prize winner, Peter Gill will give the introductory lecture at the 26^th ISFG World Congress in Krakow, Poland, in 2015. Furthermore, Josefina Gomez Fernandez (Madrid, Spain) was elected by the General Assembly as Honorary Member of the ISFG. She has been a key person for the Spanish and Portuguese Speaking Working Group of the ISFG (GHEP-ISFG) and for organizing the annual quality control exercises. During the General Assembly, elections for some members of the executive board were held. Wolfgang R. Mayr (Vienna) announced that he will retire as secretary of the ISFG at the end of this year after serving in this position for more than 30 years. Mechthild Prinz (New York) was re-elected as President for her second and final term, Walther Parson (Innsbruck) was re-elected as Representative of all Working Parties, and Peter M. Schneider (Cologne) was elected as new Secretary.

New ISFG statutes in place

The amended ISFG statutes, which were decided at the General Assembly in Vienna in September 2011, have been approved and registered by the District Court of Mainz in March 2012. The main changes include the following topics:

• §2 (1): "The society aims to promote scientific knowledge in the field of genetic markers in the human genome as applied to forensic science. This is to be accomplished by scientific meetings of the society, formation of commissions, meetings of the working groups, and by scientific publications."
• §4 (1): "Any academic graduate, or member of the technical support staff, dealing scientifically with genetic markers, can apply for full membership."
• §4 (5, new section): "The membership is considered terminated, if the annual membership fee according to § 9 has not been paid for a period of at least two years."
• §4 (7): "The membership may not be used for advertising purposes. The Executive Committee can decide to terminate the membership if in spite of a warning this regulation is violated."
• §9 (2): "Membership fees are waived for Honorary Members. For supporting members the annual fee is set to be tenfold the membership fee for full members according to § 9 section 1."

Obituary: Herbert Polesky, M.D.

Herbert Polesky, president of the 13^th International ISFG Congress 1989 in New Orleans, and former AABB president, recently passed away. He died suddenly of a heart attack in Punta Arenas, Chile on December 11 while on a trip through Chile and Argentina. Dr. Polesky is well known for his influential work in promoting safer blood products by advancing infectious disease testing. Additionally, he made significant contributions in relationship testing and the prevention of hemolytic disease in newborns. He also helped establish criteria for transfusion medicine training, helped develop the first board examination for transfusion medicine and was dedicated to education throughout his career. Herb Polesky was 78 years old.

In Memoriam George Carmody

The ISFG would like to pay tribute to the memory of the late George Carmody (1939-2011). Dr. Carmody, a native New Yorker, spent most of his career teaching evolutionary biology and population statistics at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. He had a special interest in forensic DNA. During his tenure and after his retirement he trained and advised many laboratories, prosecutors, and defense lawyers across Canada and the US. He will be missed.

FSS inquiry results published and hearings broadcasted

The inquiry launched by the Science and Technology Committee of the House of Commons (the British Parliament) examining the winding-down of the Forensic Science Service (FSS) has led to more than 400 pages of written statements submitted. All submissions can be read on the Committee website: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201011/cmselect/cmsctech/writev/forensic/contents.htm Furthermore, the Committee hearing are broadcasted live, and can also be viewed later on here: http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/science-and-technology-committee/inquiries/forensic-science-service/

Forensic use of bioinformation

An update on the "Nuffield Report on the forensic use of bioinformation" has recently been published online. The report addresses recent developments in using DNA databases, the storage of bioinformation taken from witnesses, victims and children, and the possibility of inferring ethnicity.

Letter to THE TIMES to support the FSS

The ISFG board has sent a letter to The Times to address the consequences of closing the Forensic Science Service (FSS) for the advancement of forensic genetic research in the UK. Sir Alec Jeffreys and Sir Edwin Southern are among the 33 signatories (see full text). The letter has already caused a strong reaction both in England, as well as internationally, as can be seen from the articles published by the BBC and the LA Times. This BBC news video carries a statement by the chairman of our DNA commission, Professor Peter Gill (Strathclyde/Oslo). In a newspaper statement, Sir Alec Jeffreys said: "I would love to know a little bit more about the thinking, if indeed any thinking at all went into this bizarre decision, and whether that thinking involved any understanding whatsoever about the nature of forensic science and its importance in delivering justice."

Direct access to FSI: Genetics online for ISFG members

All ISFG members have now a direct and unrestricted link from the ISFG website to the journal FSI: Genetics. Members who have not yet registered for getting access to our website have to activate their personal profile on the ISFG website to use this service. Here you find instructions about the activation procedure. Registered ISFG members can use the FSI:Genetics link on the page Journal Access in the Members' Area.

Online payment of membership fees

You can now pay your annual membership fee online by credit card (MasterCard and VISA). A secure link to a bank website has been added to your personal profile. Using a simple "one click" button, you reach the secure payment site. After the payment, you will receive a confirmation of your payment by email, as well as a PDF document with a receipt and all payment details. To use this service, you must activate your personal profile.

First Impact Factor for FSI Genetics

The first official impact factor has been calculated for FSI: Genetics by Thomson Reuters. The impact factor of 1.347 has been published in a re-release of the Journal Citation Report at the end of September. In addition, all publications beginning with Vol. 1, 2007 are fully searchable in NCBI PubMed. This will enhance the public awareness about the articles which have been published up to now in the journal, and will further stimulate the interest of colleagues to submit their manuscripts to FSI: Genetics.

Use of ISFG logo on private websites

The executive board has published guidelines for the ISFG members to comply with the statutes of the ISFG. In particular, the use of the ISFG logo and the reference to the ISFG membership on a commercial website, and to the participation in proficiency testing exercises organized by one of the ISFG working groups has been addressed.

FSI Genetics launch celebration

During the 22^nd ISFG Congress in Copenhagen, the successful launch of the new journal FSI Genetics was celebrated at a reception organized by the journal publisher Elsevier for the members of the editorial board as well as numerous journal reviewers who were present at the congress.

Welcome and Farewell

Following the elections during the General Assembly in August 2007, the executive committee of the ISFG welcomes Leonor Gusmao as a new member. She will serve as treasurer, taking over from Niels Morling, our new ISFG president. At the same time, the board bids farewell to Angel Carracedo, who is retiring from the board after having served for 16 years.

Website design

The official website of the ISFG has been completely redesigned. Following an extensive testing period, the new website has been transferred on December 23rd, 2007 to the server to replace the old ISFG web design which has been active since 2001.