Postmortem Changes

After you die, some things in your body keep on ticking, this video reveals

When you’re dead, you’re dead—right? No pulse, no brain activity, no signs of life. But at the cellular level, things can still be ticking right …

Decomposition: An Easter Story

I’m in the odd position of being someone who loves detritivores, that is, things that eat the dead. Believe me, it’s not an easy sell at a dinner party. Usually when I reveal my interest, people recoil. Often when I shake someone’s hand and I mention we are sharing mites that eat dead skin cells, I …

Dogs Can Detect Dead Bodies Better than Any Machine

If you’re a detective who needs to find a corpse, there are lots of ways to look: you can comb the woods in a line search or hunt for hidden graves …

Protophormia terraenovae

<i>Protophormia terraenovae</i> is commonly called <b>northern blowfly</b>, <b>blue-bottle fly</b> or <b>blue-assed fly</b> (<b>blue-arsed fly</b> in British English). It is distinguished …

Learning about decomposition at the body farm in San Marcos

SAN MARCOS - Daniel Wescott spends his days surrounded by death - skeletons on shelves, leathery corpses in the grass and rotund bodies rotting under …

Microbiology of death

Our discovery of how humans experience the smell of death may one day help save lives

And the sky was watching that superb cadaver<br>Blossom like a flower.<br>So frightful was the stench that you believed<br>You’d faint away upon the grass.<br>The …

Genes remain active after death

<b>Cells continue to function even after an individual dies.</b><p>That's according to a scientific study published in Nature Communications.<p>Analysing post-mortem samples, an international team of scientists showed that some genes became more active after death.<p>As well as providing an important dataset for …

Genes could record forensic clues to time of death

Scientists have found predictable patterns in the way our genetic machinery winds down after death.

#15 - Body Farms (with Anna Williams)

A death-defying dig at the grave of a serial killer

<i>First of two parts</i><p>In excavating the remains of a serial killer, certain considerations come into play.<p>In the case of this past spring's exhumation of …

Beauty in Decomposition: An Interview With Artist AJ Hawkins

In Bizarre Murder Hearing, Prosecutor Argues That Flies in Las Vegas Don’t Like Dead Bodies

Larry and Becki Lobato were sitting nervously in the back row of a Las Vegas courtroom when their daughter, 34-year-old Kirstin Blaise Lobato was …

Human Thanatomicrobiome Succession and Time Since Death.

2016 Jul 14;6:29598. doi: 10.1038/srep29598.<p>1Forensic Science Program, Physical Sciences Department, Alabama State University, Montgomery, AL 36104 …

The Thanatomicrobiome: A Missing Piece of the Microbial Puzzle of Death.

2016 Feb 24;7:225. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2016.00225. eCollection 2016.<p>1Forensic Science Program, Physical Sciences Department, Alabama State University …

Episode 42: eLife at five

0:59<p>eLife Deputy Editor Detlef Weigel explains the journal’s ethos.<p>6:09<p>We catch up on research into how bacteria in decomposing bodies may help to …

A microbial clock provides an accurate estimate of the postmortem interval in a mouse model system

Establishing the time since death is critical in every death investigation, yet existing techniques are susceptible to a range of errors and biases. …

Does the UK need a human 'body farm'?

<b>You are dead. Now what?</b><p>It's the start of a fascinating and eventful - if gory and smelly - journey, at least for your body as it decomposes.<p>Understanding decomposition can hold the key to solving murders, finding missing people and crucially recognising them, and that is why "body farms" exist.<p>Body …

Human Body Decomposition

The Ecology of Death

It’s a nature documentary trope: A migrating herd of wildebeest approaches a rushing river. Soon a few bold ones cross, followed by the rest of the …

These bugs are the most gruesome clues in forensic science

The first murder solved with the help of insects, per an account written in the year 1235, took place in China. A villager was found slashed to death. The judge summoned local farmers and told them to bring their sickles. As the farmers stood in the summer heat, insects swarmed around one man's …

Microbes as a Tool Forensic Science

Forensic science has advanced along with technological advances in genetics and biology. Now that scientists are learning more about the human …

Could a Null-Hypothesis Model Bring Greater Clarity to Forensic Entomology?

Could a Null-Hypothesis Model Bring Greater Clarity to Forensic Entomology?<p><i>Lucilia sericata</i>, also known as the common green bottle fly, is among the …

To Solve Gruesome Desert Mysteries, Scientists Become Body Collectors

Before she confrontsdeath straight on, Melissa Connor always puts on a pair of rubber boots. The shelf she takes the shoes from includes a bottle of hand sanitizer, a sign warning people to check their shoes for scorpions and a bundle of wooden stakes, each of which will eventually be marked with …

Inside Australia's first 'body farm': Grim graveyard where 100 bodies lie to help scientists solve the most gruesome crimes

• <b>A 'body farm' in Sydney uses decomposing corpses to help forensic science</b>• <b><br>The grisly facility takes donated bodies and allows them to rot naturally</b>• <b><br>It</b> …

Tennessee body farm study could impact court cases

A recent discovery at the University of Tennessee's body farm could have an immediate impact on court cases around the globe. (5/9/17 5PM)

Flies are often the first visitors to a murder scene. Studying their grisly dining habits can reveal vital clues to help catch the killer<p>Flies are regarded by most people as a nuisance at best, a harbinger of death at worst. They elicit little more than feelings of disgust and many people are happy …

Some corpses may mysteriously heat up after death

A strange case-study from the Czech Republic<p>One morning, in a hospital in the Czech Republic, a 69-year-old man died of heart disease. An hour later, as nurses were preparing to move his body down to the lab for autopsy, they noticed his skin was unusually warm. After calling the doctor back to …