Origin of blood ethanol in decomposed bodies

Biochemical pathways generating post-mortem volatile compounds co-detected during forensic ethanol analyses

“…The detection of volatile compounds has been reported in corpses from aircraft accidents [13,125,126], recovered from water [127,128] or routinely autopsied [10,11,14,129]. Moreover, various volatiles have been detected in vitro studies with post-mortem specimens or in studies with putrefying animals [5,18,130,131].…”

Ethanol formation in unadulterated postmortem tissues

“…Another commonly used criterion to evaluate postmortem ethanol formation is the presence of other volatiles in a specimen. Volatiles such as acetaldehyde, npropanol, sec-butanol, iso-propanol, acetone, and isobutanol, when discovered during routine ethanol analysis, suggests the possibility of microbial formation of ethanol [1,[11][12][13]21,22,24,30]. One of the initial goals of this study was to make a direct comparison between the increase in ethanol concentration in specimens homogenized in water and 1.00% sodium fluoride.…”

A study of ethyl glucuronide in post-mortem blood as a marker of ante-mortem ingestion of alcohol

“…However, this method is not reliable, as formation in urine and even in vitreous humour has occurred (85,106). For more specific markers of ante mortem alcohol ingestion, the altered concentration ratio between the serotonin metabolites 5-hydroxytryptophol (5-HTOL) and 5-hydroxyindole-3-acetic acid (5-HIAA) in urine has briefly been suggested (107)(108)(109)(110), as this rises after ethanol ingestion (111), but its use as a marker of ante mortem alcohol ingestion has never been studied in detail.…”