Ontario town could become home to 'human body farm'

A town in Ontario is planning to open an "outdoor research facility," commonly termed a "human body farm," where the process of decaying bodies will be observed.Kingsville has been eyed as the location for a facility proposed by the University of Windsor's forensic professor and taphonomist researcher Shari Forbes.The mission is to recreate scenarios in which humans die or decompose in a forested area — to help search for missing persons.Forbes explains to CBC News what her team would be studying, "Anything such as a missing hiker — somebody who naturally decayed on the surface [of the ground].""But in the case of a victim of homicide it may be a shallow burial where we try and see how things change when they're underneath the ground versus on top of the ground." .This will show "how different types of evidence may degrade, and sometimes the evidence associated with the bodies can be what helps us identify that person and can also help us link [the evidence] to an offender."Forbes says her research aims to understand the natural environment's impact on dead body degradation — because there is currently little research on soft tissue decomposition impacts in extreme weather (+40°C to -40°C).The research that has been conducted in this type of extremely varied climate was done on pig bodies.Moreover, research that has used human bodies was done in milder temperature areas of the US and Australia with results which prove pigs are not comparable to human decomposition..Forbes' research team plans to create a decomposition odour database by taking volatile organic compounds (VOCs) which are produced by the biochemical decay of human tissue, trapping and collecting them.They will then be used to train police cadaver-detection dog units.The dogs will then help locate the human remains, with the research hoping to identify these VOCs that are created in extreme cold environments.One other facility like this exists already in Canada, and it is located in Quebec, which opened in 2020..If built, the Kingsville facility would have a high-security fence which blocks visibility inside.Forbes also claims they will protect bodies from being tampered with by surrounding animals.

Ontario town could become home to 'human body farm'

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