Prediction of minimum postmortem submersion interval (PMSImin) based on eukaryotic community succession on skeletal remains recovered from a lentic environment

Microbial community succession of submerged bones in an aquatic habitat

“…Studies of postmortem microbial communities in terrestrial habitats show differences among body sites of vertebrate carcasses [6,7,32,58,63], organ types [53], mammal species [63], carcasses versus blow fly larvae [62], and even personal objects handled by a decedent [56]. For aquatic decomposition, these microbial differences were found among epinecrotic and epilithic biofilms [60], ventral vs. dorsal carcass surfaces [9], and bone types [10,12]. Differences in the terrestrial bone postmortem microbiome also exist between soil and bones [16] and among different bone types [17].…”

“…These include tiles for biofilm formation [60], swine remains [9,11,20,21,61], salmon [62], and swine bones without a full carcass [10,12]. The aquatic systems also differed among studies, ranging from tidal and freshwater systems [10–12], to small streams [21,60], rivers [61], and marine environments [20]. We report results for sunken swine remains decomposing in a freshwater pond, which differs from the other study locations and makes quantitative inferential comparisons difficult.…”

“…Therefore, it is important to characterize postmortem microbial communities in an aquatic system for PMSI estimation model building, as studies in terrestrial systems do not readily apply [9]. To date, microbial succession studies in aquatic ecosystems have primarily focused only on specific body parts of a model organism (e.g., Sus scrofa heads) or sunken remains over shorter-term (<1 year) time periods [9,15,20,21], with a limited number of studies on fungal community (mycobiome) succession in aquatic circumstances [11,12]. To our knowledge, there has been only one study of longer-term (>1 year) microbial community succession of bones in an aquatic environment [10].…”

“…Longer‐term decomposition studies in an aquatic environment provide novel insight into the potential of microbial community succession and PMSI modeling for future forensic death investigation. We hypothesized predictable microbial community succession would emerge based on previous success with aquatic decomposition in shorter‐term PMSIs [9], as well as with bones [10,12]. We also hypothesize that microbial communities within bones would differ from bone surface communities due to different environmental factors, such as bioerosion and sources of exogenous taxa from the surrounding environment not immediately present inside bones; however, over the longer‐term these communities would converge to similar community structure.…”

At the Interface of Life and Death: Post-mortem and Other Applications of Vaginal, Skin, and Salivary Microbiome Analysis in Forensics

“…can differentially influence the post-mortem body site-specific microbiome. For the latter, the application of epinecrotic communities such as aquatic microbes on the post-mortem submersion interval estimation could be highly relevant in aquatic death investigations ( Benbow et al, 2015 ; Cartozzo et al, 2021 ; Randall et al, 2021 ). While the exact effect sizes are rarely reported ( Meurs, 2016 ), abiotic factors, such as insects and soils beneath a decomposing body ( Cobaugh et al, 2015 ; Metcalf et al, 2016 ; Adserias-Garriga et al, 2017a ; Keenan et al, 2019 ), seasonal variation, and distinct climates ( Carter et al, 2015 ), but also exposure and clothing ( Goff, 2009 ), are some of the driving determinants of the microbial succession after death.…”