Prompt Cast
The Gruesome but Necessary Study of Body Farms
TLDR Body farms are facilities that study the decomposition of human bodies and provide valuable information about the length of time a body has been decaying. Forensic anthropologists can determine important information such as gender, ethnicity, and age even when only bones remain.
Timestamped Summary
00:00
The podcast episode is about body farms, which are gruesome but necessary facilities that study the decomposition of human bodies.
03:36
Body farms are facilities that study decomposition and there are currently three in the United States, one in North Carolina, one in Tennessee, and one in Texas.
07:08
Insects, particularly flies and maggots, can provide valuable information about the length of time a body has been decaying.
10:44
Forensic anthropologists are most useful when there is no flesh left on a body and only bones remain, as they can still determine important information such as gender, ethnicity, and age.
14:12
When only a skeleton is found, forensic anthropologists can still determine gender, ethnicity, and age by looking at the size of the bones, differences in the pelvic bone, the shape of the forehead and chin, and the width of the pelvic inlet.
17:51
Body farms rely on body donations, and in 2006, the University of Tennessee had more corpses and skeletons on its campus than it had Asian students enrolled.
21:18
Dr. Bass exhumed a body to put to rest a long persisting legend, and determined that every bone in the body was crushed and there was no way the person survived the crash.
24:41
Body farms don't allow journalists or weirdos in, and the smell of decomposing bodies is very different from that of dead animals.
Categories:
Society & Culture
