ArticleForensic science, medicine, and pathology2014
DNA and RNA analysis of blood and muscle from bodies with variable postmortem intervals.
Article in Forensic science, medicine, and pathology, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 48 citations in OpenAlex.
- Are pre-analytical factors fully considered in forensic FFPE molecular analyses? A systematic review reveals the need for standardised procedures.International journal of legal medicine · 2025Pooled it
- Bone Marrow as a Source of DNA in Forensic Genetics: An Optimized Nucleic Acids Extraction Protocol.Genes · 2026Article
- Serological and molecular analysis of henipavirus infections in synanthropic fruit bat and rodent populations in the Centre and North regions of Cameroon (2018-2020).BMC veterinary research · 2025Article
- An experimental study to estimate the early postmortem interval based on the degradation of lncRNAs in rat brain tissue.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Blood taken immediately after fatal resuscitation attempts yields higher quality DNA for genetic studies as compared to autopsy samples.International journal of legal medicine · 2023Article
- Review of the current and potential use of biological and molecular methods for the estimation of the postmortem interval in animals and humans.Journal of veterinary diagnostic investigation : official publication of the American Association of Veterinary Laboratory Diagnosticians, Inc · 2023Review
- DNA quality evaluation of formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded heart tissue for DNA methylation array analysis.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Predicting the Postmortem Interval Based on Gravesoil Microbiome Data and a Random Forest Model.Microorganisms · 2022Article
- Combining with lab-on-chip technology and multi-organ fusion strategy to estimate post-mortem interval of rat.Frontiers in medicine · 2022Article
- Study on activity of different tissues from juvenile Yangtze sturgeon in the early post-mortem period.In vitro cellular & developmental biology. Animal · 2022Article
- MALDI-TOF MS as a Novel Tool for the Estimation of Postmortem Interval in Liver Tissue Samples.Scientific reports · 2017Article
- Article
- Comparison of DNA yield and STR success rates from different tissues in embalmed bodies.International journal of legal medicine · 2017Article
- Differential expression and localization of Ankrd2 isoforms in human skeletal and cardiac muscles.Histochemistry and cell biology · 2016Article
- DNA and RNA profiling of excavated human remains with varying postmortem intervals.International journal of legal medicine · 2016Article
- Quantification of nucleic acid quality in postmortem tissues from a cancer research autopsy program.Oncotarget · 2016Article
- Potential use of bacterial community succession for estimating post-mortem interval as revealed by high-throughput sequencing.Scientific reports · 2016Article
- The apoptotic thanatotranscriptome associated with the liver of cadavers.Forensic science, medicine, and pathology · 2015Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The breakdown of DNA and RNA in decomposing human tissue represents a major obstacle for postmortem forensic molecular analysis. This study investigated the feasibility of performing PCR-based molecular analysis of blood and muscle tissue from 45 autopsy cases with defined postmortem intervals ranging from one to more than 14 days. It was not possible to collect blood from 38 % of the autopsy cases due to severe coagulation and hemolysis, whereas muscle tissue was available for all cases. PCR-amplifiable DNA could be extracted from 96 % of the frozen muscle specimens and from 93 % of the formalin fixed and paraffin embedded (FFPE) muscle specimens. A quality assessment of muscle-derived DNA showed increased fragmentation with advancing body decomposition and generally more fragmentation in DNA from FFPE tissue than in DNA from frozen tissue. It was possible to amplify 1,000 basepair (bp) DNA fragments from all samples with postmortem intervals below 3 days whereas 400-600 bp long fragments typically could be amplified from the most decomposed muscle specimens. RNA was less stable than DNA in postmortem muscle tissue, yet selected mRNA molecules could be detected by reverse-transcriptase PCR in all samples up to 3 days after death. We conclude that analysis of DNA from bodies with a wide postmortem interval range is usually possible whereas the consistency of RNA analyses decreases considerably 3 days postmortem. We showed that muscle tissue is a highly usable source of DNA and RNA for postmortem forensic molecular analysis as well as for retrospective research projects based on archived FFPE specimens.
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