۱- Introduction

۲- Water; one of the prerequisites for life as we know it

۳- Isoscapes

۴- Stable isotope ecology

۵- Forensic isotope ecology

۶- Caveats — a fishy example

۷- Conclusions

۸- The science bit: isotopologues, chemically identical yet not the same

References

Abstract

Stable isotope ecology and forensic isotope ecology are not only linked by name. More often than not, knowledge and insights gained through the former serve as a springboard for application focused work of the latter. This review aims to offer a glimpse into the fascinating world of both though with more emphasis on forensic isotope ecology. To this end a selection of past and recent published work is presented and discussed to highlight both potential and limitations of isotopic analytical approaches to the detection of illegal trade in plants and animals.

Introduction

Ecology, and its underpinning environmental studies, are two areas within natural and life sciences with a long history of applying stable isotope chemistry and bio-chemistry to gain insights into, for example, food webs, life cycles, or migration. It was only a matter of time before the methods that were developed, and the insights gained during ecological studies, were extended to wildlife forensics. For the appreciation of as wide an audience as possible, in addition to highlighting the wealth of information that stable isotope abundance signatures can provide, in Section 8 this review also provides some background information on the nature of stable isotopes, the terminology used, and why their relative abundance varies in the natural world. In-depth treatises on the subject of stable isotope chemistry in the context of ecological, geochemical, and forensic sciences, have been published in the form of several textbooks [1–۵].