Research is a key part of Tim's job, so much so that the Technology Futures Institute at Teesside University current buy-out 30% of his time in order for him to undertake new research in appiled biological anthropology and human identification. Needless to say, his research directly influences his teaching and consultancy work.

Tim's research tends to focus on two key areas: the effect of burning on human remains and subsequent identification, and the body in the forensic context.

Burning changes bone. The questions that we are asking are (1) how, (2) to what extent, and (3) how does this affect our attempts to identify burned individuals. Tim and his colleagues have been using an innovative suite of techniques to investigate this problem and have produced a number of important publications.

Burning affects the shape and size of bones. Anthropological techniques of identification rely on unmodified bone dimensions to succeed accurately. Therefore, recent research has looked into the degree of dimensional change as a precursor to predicting the inevitable change in bone due to fire. More information can be found here.

Biological and forensic anthropology really focusses on the human body, and attempts to understand people and their actions from it. Making leaps from the biological body to social and cultural actions is difficult and challenging, but exciting.

Tim's research focusses on three different aspects of the body, and it is hoped that study here will help future workers to glean a little bit more information from human remains with a little more confidence. The key areas are body image, trauma to the body and what happens to the body after death.