Rehydration and restoration of fingerprint ridge detail in mummified post‐mortem tissue: Literature review and investigation of a simplified formulation

Abstract

Mummified tissue presents challenges for fingerprinting due to rigidity, shrinkage, and other features obscuring epidermal ridge detail. A new cost-effective in-house solution was developed to obtain good quality fingerprints from mummified remains. The simplified procedure uses a sodium carbonate:sodium acetate mixture easily prepared How to cite this article: Marais AAS, van den Dool AH.Rehydration and restoration of fingerprint ridge detail in mummified post-mortem tissue: Literature review and investigation of a simplified formulation.

Technical note: A comparison between rehydrating solutions in the pretreatment of mummified and corified skin for forensic microscopic examination

“…Forensic histological studies focusing on human bodies in an advanced state of decomposition are few [ 4 , 9 , 20 – 24 ]. There are neither detailed protocols suitable for mummified or corified bodies nor consensus on the exact mechanisms involved in rehydration techniques [ 24 ].…”

“…Forensic histological studies focusing on human bodies in an advanced state of decomposition are few [ 4 , 9 , 20 – 24 ]. There are neither detailed protocols suitable for mummified or corified bodies nor consensus on the exact mechanisms involved in rehydration techniques [ 24 ]. These special post-mortem phenomena have been studied outside forensic practice only concerning a few aspects: rehydration with Sandison’s rehydrating solution to improve histoarchitecture [ 9 ], thermal stabilization to avoid its loss during preparation [ 25 ], prolongation of histological processing time for structural preservation [ 26 ], and successful detection of nuclear chromatin and DNA profiles in highly degraded cadavers without necessarily using bone tissue [ 27 ].…”

A Necropapiloscopia e o DNA como ferramentas de identificação humana post mortem: uma revisão integrativa

“…A qualidade da impressão das digitais pode estar diretamente relacionada à condição do cadáver, que, por sua vez, pode-se encontrar em avançado estado de decomposição, especificamente em casos de mumificação, carbonização, maceração e putrefação avançada. Diferentes abordagens de reidratação e restauração têm sido usadas para enfrentar esses desafios, mas as mais comuns envolvem aplicação de injetáveis ou solução de imersão [11]. A Tabela 1 apresenta os principais resultados obtidos.…”