NASA's Artemis program is scheduled to return astronauts to the moon and establish a permanent orbiting laboratory by the end of the decade.

Meanwhile, private companies are making significant steps in taking paying customers further into space. As humanity's footprint expands beyond the familiar terrains of Earth to the moon and possibly beyond, an intriguing new field emerges from the final frontier: astroforensics.

This discipline, still in its infancy, is propelled by the inevitability of human nature. Space presents a unique and harsh environment for forensic investigations. Settings that present altered gravity, cosmic radiation, extremes in temperature, and the need for oxygen-providing climate systems provide a few examples of the unearthly variables that are faced by future explorers.

Unlike Earth, where gravity, a constant force, shapes many aspects of our reality, the significant reduction of gravity in space introduces novel challenges in understanding how evidence behaves. This shift is crucial for forensic sciences like bloodstain pattern analysis, which relies heavily on gravitational effects to determine the circumstances under which blood stains are formed.

The thought of gravity in space immediately conjures images of astronauts hauntingly suspended in the void of space or floating gymnastics in the International Space Station (ISS).

As more people seek to go where no man has gone before, researchers are exploring how forensic science can be adapted to extraterrestrial environments.

A new study by Staffordshire University and the University of Hull highlights the behavior of blood in microgravity and the unique challenges of bloodstain pattern analysis aboard spacecraft.

Bloodstain expert Zack Kowalske is a Crime Scene Investigator based in Atlanta, U.S., and led the study as part his Ph.D. research at Staffordshire University.

"Studying bloodstain patterns can provide valuable reconstructive information about a crime or accident. However, little is known about how liquid blood behaves in an altered gravity environment. This is an area of study that, while novel, has implications for forensic investigations in space," he commented.

"Forensic science is more than just trying to solve crimes; it additionally has a role in accident reconstruction or failure analysis.