Raman spectroscopy differentiates legal and illegal ivory

While trading/procuring elephant ivory is illegal, it is not illegal to sell ivory from extinct species, such as preserved mammoth tusk ivory.

This legal source of ivory, said to be part of an increasing and lucrative ‘mammoth hunter’ industry, poses a time-consuming and enforcement problem for customs teams as ivory from these two different types of tusk are broadly similar, making it difficult to distinguish from one another, especially once specimens have become worked or carved.

In this new EPSRC-funded study published in PLOS ONE, scientists from Bristol’s School of Anatomy and Lancaster Medical School sought to establish whether Raman spectroscopy could be modified to accurately detect differences in the chemistry of mammoth and elephant ivory.  The non-destructive technology, which involves shining a high-energy light at an ivory specimen, can detect small biochemical differences in elephant and mammoth tusks. 

Researchers scanned samples of mammoth and elephant tusks from London’s Natural History Museum using the laser based method and results showed that the technology provided accurate, quick and non-destructive species identification.