Deep learning in forensic gunshot wound interpretation—a proof-of-concept study

While the applications of deep learning are considered revolutionary within several medical specialties, forensic applications have been scarce despite the visual nature of the field. For example, a forensic pathologist may benefit from deep learning-based tools in gunshot wound interpretation. This proof-of-concept study aimed to test the hypothesis that trained neural network architectures have potential to predict shooting distance class on the basis of a simple photograph of the gunshot wound. A dataset of 204 gunshot wound images (60 negative controls, 50 contact shots, 49 close-range shots, and 45 distant shots) was constructed on the basis of nineteen piglet carcasses fired with a .22 Long Rifle pistol. The dataset was used to train, validate, and test the ability of neural net architectures to correctly classify images on the basis of shooting distance. Deep learning was performed using the AIDeveloper open-source software. Of the explored neural network architectures, a trained multilayer perceptron based model (MLP_24_16_24) reached the highest testing accuracy of 98%. Of the testing set, the trained model was able to correctly classify all negative controls, contact shots, and close-range shots, whereas one distant shot was misclassified. Our study clearly demonstrated that in the future, forensic pathologists may benefit from deep learning-based tools in gunshot wound interpretation. With these data, we seek to provide an initial impetus for larger-scale research on deep learning approaches in forensic wound interpretation. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00414-021-02566-3.