According to Biology professor Dr. David Beresford, his new course in Forensic Entomology might just be the “most exciting course ever done” at Trent. Offered for the first time in the summer of 2007 and again for the winter term in 2008, this intriguing biology course “looks at the science of using insects for forensic purposes”, which includes establishing a post-mortem interval of the death of an animal or determining the geographic origin of foreign substances.

Despite its forensic applications, the third-year course is, at its heart, rooted in biology and biological systems. As Prof. Beresford explains, students must adjust their frames of mind from studying the corpse of a specimen to examining the living organisms and insects that use the corpse to survive and flourish.

“A corpse is a package of nutrition that appears at random,” says Prof. Beresford, who started teaching at Trent in 2006, and proposed the development of a course in forensic entomology shortly after. “This course is based on living organisms and insects, not dead things. It’s about what is living on the corpse; it is a biology course – it’s all about the insects.”

For Prof. Beresford, this new course is his ideal subject. Since he was a child, he has been fascinated by the lives of insects, and especially flies. He transferred that curiosity into a Ph.D. in Trent’s Watershed Ecosystems Graduate Program. Now, he is pleased to pass along his knowledge, and passion for the subject, to his students.

“It’s about getting students to see past the grotesque to the beauty of the natural system,” he explains. “It really is amazing.”

Prof. Beresford is especially proud of how the course is set up. In his classroom, students not only study important theory on the subject through seminars and course work, they also get hands-on experience working with real specimens. In the summer course, for example, students started the semester by placing beaver carcasses outside of the DNA Building on campus. Each class, they returned to collect the insects and maggots that arrived to feed on the nutrients provided by the specimen.

When asked what he hopes students will take from this course, Prof. Beresford replies, “I hope students will learn good science, the interconnectedness of systems, and gain insight into things they haven’t thought of before.”