A county cleanup crew found human remains in Rocky Mount in February of 2009. Months later, the remains were in the N.C. State forensic anthropology lab in the process of being identified. Students, both graduate and undergraduate, helped in the investigation.

The body was identified as Elizabeth Smallwood, the sixth victim of the Edgecombe County serial killer. Because of the real world experience for students, Popular Science magazine recognized the University’s forensic lab as one of the country’s “30 Most Awesome College Labs.”

The lab, located in Park Shops, was established in 2009 as part of the renovations of Park Shops. It and three other labs were missing components of the Sociology and Anthropology department.

Associate professor of anthropology James Wallace III said the labs were very effective.

“The facilities came online a few years ago,” Wallace said. “We have one of the best programs in the southeast.”

The department offers a Bachelor of Arts degree and Masters degree in anthropology, as well as a specialization in bio-archeology. Before the labs were built, associate professor Ann Ross said she needed to use other facilities.

“I was collaborating with the office of state archeology,” Ross said. “I used to have to go downtown to my colleague’s, Dr. Oliver’s, lab.”

Ross is an internationally renowned forensic anthropologist. She has worked in Bosnia, aiding in the identification of genocide victims from the Bosnian War. She has also helped to identify bodies of people killed during the reign of Augusto Pinochet in Chile and in Panama where she identified mass grave victims of Manuel Noriega.

As a professor, Ross thinks student research is important.

“I try to get [graduate students] to at least get out of here with a publication in a major journal,” Ross said.

However, it is not just graduate students that Ross involves in research.

“I’ve had a lot of undergraduates assist with certain projects,” Ross said. “We have a comparative non-human collection, so I sometimes have students come in and help with processing of the remains if they have tissue on them, to get the bones.”

The non-human collection is an ongoing study in coordination with the entomology department on bone decomposition using pigs. A facility near Lake Wheeler houses the experiments.

“We do studies on time since death, post mortem interval, using pigs as proxies, where we leave pigs out to decompose and we look at the degradation of bone,” Ross said.

Ross explained that pigs are a common animal used in place of humans for scientific research.

“They are substitutes for human research because they have been found to be pretty similar in tissue and in fat,” she said.

Ross specializes in find the identity of skeletal remains.

“Forensic anthropology has a specialty in hard tissue or bone,” Ross said. “A medical examiner’s specialty is in soft tissue. So, when you have a body that’s very decomposed to where you can’t tell who they are anymore, they need the help of an anthropologist because they are not experts in bone.”

In determining identity, she looks at several key details.

“We look at age of death, how tall they were, what population they’re from, or what ancestry, whether they’re male or female. We also look at if there are any diseases that show up on the bone,” Ross said. “We also help the medical examiner with determination of trauma. For example, we can identify a gunshot wound.”

Shows like CSI may be entertaining, but they are not reality, according to Ross.

“They are all Hollywood,” Ross said. “In CSI they have the entomologist that can do bone, that can solve the case in five minutes, when really it takes weeks — and it’s not glamorous.”