Estimating Time of Death by Circadian Rhythm
Researchers have recently found that they could estimate a healthy person’s time of death, with accuracy to within a few hours, by analyzing the activity levels of a set of genes within certain regions of the deceased brain. In normal and healthy brains, this gene activity “clock” changes in response to the different times of day, and can show which genes were most recently active before the individual passed away. However, people with severe depression have a disrupted “biological clock” that makes it seem as if they are living in a different time zone to the rest of the healthy population, throwing off this established correlation. University of Michigan’s Dr. Jun Li describes that the daily cycles of depressed individuals “are not only shifted, but also disrupted,” which further throws off the accuracy of the time of death estimation.
Source: forensicmag.com
[Abstract by ForensIQ Intern – Mark Lombard]
Citation:
Connor, S. The Independent. New forensic technique for estimating time of death by checking internal clock of the human brain. Retrieved May 15, 2013, from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/new-forensic-technique-for-estimating-time-of-death-by-checking-internal-clock-of-the-human-brain-8614624.html
