Post-mortem interval

Postmortem interval estimations can range from hours, to days or even years depending on the type of evidence present.

[4] Factors that can affect the rate of human decomposition are concerned with the particular environment a body has been recovered from.

[2] Bodies can be found anywhere from terrestrial to aquatic environments, each possessing their own variables that can alter interval estimations.

[5][6] A very approximate rule of thumb for estimating the postmortem interval is as follows:[7] Due to significant environmental variations between regions, universal formulas would be ill-suited for this topic in forensic science.

[8] There are analytical techniques that can be used to determine the post-mortem interval:[3] More advanced methods include DNA quantification,[12] infrared spectroscopy,[13] and for buried individuals changes in soil composition such as the levels of methane,[14] phosphates and nitrates,[15] ninhydrin-reactive nitrogen,[16] volatile organic compounds,[17] and water conductivity,[18] could also reveal the time of death.