Schroeder Hilke, Klotzbach Heike, Püschel Klaus
Institute of Legal Medicine, University Hospital Hamburg-Eppendorf, Butenfeld 34, 22529 Hamburg, Germany.
Leg Med (Tokyo). 2003 Mar;5 Suppl 1:S372-4. doi: 10.1016/s1344-6223(02)00135-9.
The succession of insects is commonly used for estimation of the postmortem interval (PMI). In the warm season there are many insect species, which enable us to estimate the time of death, but in the cold season there are less species. For the estimation of a seasonal pattern, we examined 117 human corpses found in domestic environment during the year 2001. We found three typical 'summer species', active from May until October, three further species active from April until November. One blowfly species (Calliphora vicina) and the family of scuttle flies were active all over the year. These insects may be useful for PMI estimation in winter; however, further research concerning the developmental rate of scuttle flies is required. The distinct seasonal pattern of the early colonizing blowfly species allows to allocate the time of death to a particular time interval even in cases of long PMIs if empty puparia of these insects are found.
昆虫演替通常用于估计死后间隔时间（PMI）。在温暖季节，有许多昆虫种类，这使我们能够估计死亡时间，但在寒冷季节，昆虫种类较少。为了估计季节性模式，我们调查了2001年期间在家庭环境中发现的117具人类尸体。我们发现了三种典型的“夏季物种”，从5月到10月活跃，另外三种物种从4月到11月活跃。一种丽蝇（红头丽蝇）和蚤蝇科全年都很活跃。这些昆虫可能有助于冬季PMI的估计；然而，需要对蚤蝇的发育速率进行进一步研究。早期定殖的丽蝇种类独特的季节性模式使得即使在死后间隔时间较长的情况下，如果发现这些昆虫的空蛹壳，也能够将死亡时间分配到特定的时间间隔。
