Rate My Professor Cris Hughes

Hughes specializes in forensic anthropology, with research interests encompassing the use and limitations of ancestry estimations from skeletal variation, reliability measures for biological profile estimation methods, and identification disparities in missing and unidentified persons cases. Her scholarship has attracted significant funding, including a Department of Justice grant ($267,117, 2019–2021) for developing the Forensic Anthropology Database for Assessing Methods Accuracy (FADAMA), a UIUC Interdisciplinary Innovation Initiative grant ($189,000, 2012–2014), and a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship (2005–2007). Key publications include "Considerations for age estimation accuracy: Method‐derived outcomes and practitioner interpretations" (Journal of Forensic Sciences, 2024, co-authored with Yim and Juarez), "Investigating identification disparities in forensic anthropology casework" (PLoS ONE, 2023), "Forensic Anthropology Casework Performance: Assessing Accuracy and Trends for Biological Profile Estimates" (Journal of Forensic Sciences, 2021, with Juarez and Yim), "Temporal Patterns of Mexican Migrant Ancestry: Implications for Identifications" (American Anthropologist, 2017), and a chapter on intimate partner violence in Broken Bones (2nd ed., 2013). She contributes to editorial and standards boards, including the American Academy of Forensic Sciences Anthropology Section Standards Board (since 2016), reviews for journals like PLOS Genetics and Human Biology, and serves on advisory boards for police training institutes and human rights organizations. Her work influences forensic practices by improving method accuracy and addressing equity in investigations.