Estimation of the time of death through the analysis of clock miRNAs expression in blood and vitreous humor

Abstract

Estimation of the time since death is a practical task in daily forensic casework but available methods lack reliability especially in complex deaths and after long PM period. MirRNA analysis should be ideally an useful ancillary tool as it proved to be sensitive in forensics especially for body fluid identification.\ud Here we analyzed 10 miRNAs with a supposed role in circadian rhythms through an RT-qPCR assay in postmortem samples of blood (n = 12) and vitreous humor (n = 12) from individuals died in the day or at night, in order to find those with an oscillating pattern of variation. The expression stability of four endogenous controls was also tested to find the most suitable for normalization.SNORD95 proved to be the best and was used in both body fluids. Four miRNAs showed significant differential expression between individuals died at daytime and at nighttime, mir-106b and mir-96 in vitreal samples and mir-142-5p and mir-219 in blood. Results are preliminary and limited to the small sample set. Future studies on more samples and with additional markers are needed to further elucidate the role of miRNA profiling in postmortem contexts and how useful they would be as “chronobiomarkers” for time of death determinatio

A small RNA, microRNA as a potential biomolecular marker to estimate post mortem interval in forensic science: a systematic review

“… 9 Ye-Hui Lv et al [ 9 ] 2017 China Human 7 males 6 females ( n = 13) Rats Sprague-Dawley) ( n = 36) 5 hemorrhagic shocks 4 brain trauma 4 mechanical asphyxia Cervical dislocation Temperature 4 °C, 15 °C, 25 °C 35 °C 0,24,48,72,96,120, and 144 H Myocardium (Apex Cordis) Liver (right lobe) Brain (frontal) RNAiso Plus (Takara, Japan) RT-qPCR miR-133a miR-122 miR-1 miR-133a and miR-1 have high stability in muscle myocardium for more than five days at all temperatures. miR-122 degraded along PMI in the Liver, especially at high temperature miR-1 and miR-133a can act as a marker or reference genes in the heart because they have high stability, while miR-122 cannot be used as a reference gene in the liver because it has degraded Not listed 10 Ye-Hui Lv et al [ 28 ] 2016 China Human ( n = 12) Rats (Sprague-Dawley) ( n = 216) - Cervical dislocation Temperature 10 ± 1, 20 ± 1, 30 ± 1 °C 1, 3, 6, 12, 24, 36, 48, 72, 96, 120, and 144 H Lung Muscle (Femoral Quadriceps) Lung RNAiso Plus (Takara Japan) RT-qPCR miR-206 miR-1 miR-200c miR-195 miR-195 is stable in the Lung tissue along the post-mortem interval miR-200c is stable in the Lung tissue along the post-mortem interval miR-1 and miR-206 have stable expression levels in muscle along the post-mortem interval miR-195 and miR-200c were chosen as reference genes in the Lung, while miR-1 and miR-206 were chosen as reference genes in muscle because they have stable characteristics It does not display antemortem data affecting 11 Corradini B et al [ 35 ] 2015 Italy Human ( n = 18) Died during the day and at night Whole blood ≤ 48 H Vitreous humor ≤ 24 H Whole blood Vitreous humor miRNeasy Micro Kit (QIAGEN, Hilden, Germany) RT-qPCR miR-142-3p miR-132-3p miR-182-5p miR-26a-5p miR-96-5p miR-194-5p miR-106b-5...…”

Acute Spinal Cord Injury: A Systematic Review Investigating miRNA Families Involved

“…SCI is featured by different forms of injury, and after investigating the pathology and degree of clinical diagnosis and treatment strategies, animal models have allowed us to better understand this entity and, finally, the role of new diagnostic and prognostic tools such as miRNA could improve our ability to manage this pathological entity. Autopsy could benefit from improvements in miRNA research: the specificity and sensitivity of miRNAs could help physicians in determining the cause of death, besides the time of death [185]. The literature describes specific microRNAs that may provide indications for understanding some crime scene investigations and pathological processes in the cadavers.…”

The potential of using non-coding RNAs in forensic science applications

“…Corradini et al . [ 6 ] further investigated the expression of certain miRNAs in vitreous fluid and blood. Significant differential expression between day and night deaths were found for two miRNAs in the vitreous humour, miR-106b and miR-96, and for two miRNAs in blood, miR-142-5p and miR-219.…”