Body farm opens in Florida

LAND O'LAKES, Fla. – A body farm, a scientific facility for the study of how bodies decompose, is being planted in Florida.

Officials broke ground Friday on the Adam Kennedy Forensics Field, a 5-acre patch of land north of Tampa.

Forensics experts and law enforcement officers hope to turn the center into the world's biggest of its kind, enabling researchers to study facets of decomposition, including how the environment, weather and other factors affect the body.

Four bodies will be buried in the coming days. Professors at USF will exhume them in January and lead detectives through a course of study.

The facility is named after a school principal who died in a car crash. His body will be among the first to be buried.