Postmortem submersion interval estimation of cadavers recovered from freshwater based on gut microbial community succession

Abstract

Microbial community succession during decomposition has been proven to be a useful tool for postmortem interval (PMI) estimation. Numerous studies have shown that the intestinal microbial community presented chronological changes after death and was stable in terrestrial corpses with different causes of death. However, the postmortem pattern of intestinal microbial community succession in cadavers retrieved from water remains unclear. For immersed corpses, the postmortem submersion interval (PMSI) is a useful indicator of PMI. To provide reliable estimates of PMSI in forensic investigations, we investigated the gut microbial community succession of corpses submersed in freshwater and explored its potential application in forensic investigation. In this study, the intestinal microbial community of mouse submersed in freshwater that died of drowning or CO2 asphyxia (i.e., postmortem submersion) were characterized by 16S rDNA amplification and high-throughput sequencing, followed by bioinformatic analyses. The results demonstrated that the chronological changes in intestinal bacterial communities were not different between the drowning and postmortem submersion groups. α-diversity decreased significantly within 14 days of decomposition in both groups, and the β-diversity bacterial community structure ordinated chronologically, inferring the functional pathway and phenotype. To estimate PMSI, a regression model was established by random forest (RF) algorithm based on the succession of postmortem microbiota. Furthermore, 15 genera, including Proteus, Enterococcus, and others, were selected as candidate biomarkers to set up a concise predicted model, which provided a prediction of PMSI [MAE (± SE) = 0.818 (± 0.165) d]. Overall, our present study provides evidence that intestinal microbial community succession would be a valuable marker to estimate the PMSI of corpses submerged in an aquatic habitat.