What is the Difference Between Luminol and Bluestar

The key difference between Luminol and Bluestar is that Luminol is comparatively less stable, whereas Bluestar is comparatively more stable.

Luminol and Bluestar are important components in forensic diagnosis processes. Bluestar is a luminol-based reagent. It is useful in testing blood for investigative purposes. Substantially, Bluestar is more expensive than Luminol due to its ability to give a brighter fluorescence for a long time period.

CONTENTS

1. Overview and Key Difference
2. What is Luminol  
3. What is Bluestar
4. Luminol vs Bluestar in Tabular Form
5. Summary – Luminol vs Bluestar 

What is Luminol?

Luminol is a chemical compound that can exhibit chemiluminescence with a blue color glow. It gives this fluorescence upon mixing a substance with a suitable oxidizing agent. This substance appears as a white-to-pale-yellow crystalline solid. Luminol is water-insoluble, but it is soluble in many polar organic solvents.

Figure 01: The Chemical Structure of Luminol

This substance is important in forensic diagnosis processes for detecting small amounts of blood that are collected at crime scenes. Luminol can react with iron in hemoglobin in the blood. Therefore, we can use this substance in many cellular assays as well for the detection of copper, iron, cyanides, and some specific proteins through the western blotting technique.

If we spray Luminol evenly throughout an area, small quantities of an activating oxidant can make Luminol emit a blue color fluorescence glow that appears in a darker room. This glow typically lasts for 30 seconds. However, we can easily document it through photography. If we spray more Luminol in the area, it gives a very bright blue glow. However, the intensity of this glow does not indicate the quantity of blood in that particular area.

Figure 02: Blue Glow of Luminol

We can synthesize Luminol through a two-step process, which begins with 3-nitrophthalic acid. As the first step, we need to heat hydrazine with 3-naphthalic acid in the presence of a high billing solvent, including triethylene glycol and glycerol. Here, an acyl substitution condensation reaction takes place. Therefore, a water molecule is lost from the reaction step and forms 3-nitrophthalhydrazide. Lumino forms from the reduction of the nitro group to an amino group in the presence of sodium dithionite. This occurs via an intermediate known as hydroxylamine.

What is Bluestar?

Bluestar is the most effective blood developer and detector used at crime scenes or in laboratories. It is a type of luminol-based reagent. This reagent has an extreme sensitivity, which allows forensic detection processes to detect traces of blood with the naked eye. Moreover, Bluestar is more stable than Luminol. But it is more expensive than Luminol due to its ability to give a brighter fluorescence for a long time period. This is an important blood enhancement reagent and can reveal blood stains that have been washed out, wiped off, or is invisible to the naked eye. This reagent has been specially produced with the intention of using it at crime scene investigations.

What is the Difference Between Luminol and Bluestar?

Bluestar is a luminol-based reagent. It is useful in testing blood for forensic purposes. The key difference between Luminol and Bluestar is that Luminol is comparatively less stable, whereas Bluestar is comparatively more stable. Moreover, Bluestar is more expensive than Luminol due to its ability to give a brighter fluorescence for a long time period.

The below infographic presents the differences between Luminol and Bluestar in tabular form for side by side comparison.

Summary – Luminol vs Bluestar

Luminol and Bluestar are important components in forensic diagnosis processes. The key difference between Luminol and Bluestar is that Luminol is comparatively less stable, whereas Bluestar is comparatively more stable.

Reference:

1. “Bluestar Reagent.” Bluestar Forensic.

Image Courtesy:

1. “Luminol” By Fvasconcellos – Own work (Public Domain) via Commons Wikimedia
2. “Luminol2006” By David Muelheims (David Mülheims, Germany) – Self-photographed (CC BY-SA 2.5) via Commons Wikimedia

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