Shoe Print Evidence Gets the Google Treatment

A shoeprint etched in blood or dust can make a crucial difference in a criminal case, but it all depends on the ability of human examiners to identify a matching shoeprint pattern from thousands in their databases.

It's a laborious, inefficient task.

That's why University at Buffalo computer scientists are developing tools to make the search-and-match process more like a Google search and less like hunting for a needle in a haystack.