Ubiquitin expression in skin wounds and its application to forensic wound age determination.
The time-dependent expression of ubiquitin (Ub) was examined in murine skin wounds and 55 human skin wounds with different wound ages (groups I: 0-12 h, II: 1-5 days, III: 7-14 days and IV: 17-21 days). In murine skin wound specimens, neutrophils, macrophages and fibroblasts showed intensive Ub-positive reactions in the nuclei. In the human wound specimens with wound ages between 4 h and 1 day, neutrophils with strong intranuclear positive reactions for Ub were observed. With increasing wound ages, the nuclei of macrophages and fibroblasts were more intensively stained with anti-Ub antibody. Morphometrically, the intranuclear Ub-positive ratios were very low in group I. The skin wound specimens in groups II and IV showed Ub-positive ratios of >10%, and all samples in group III had Ub-positive ratios of >20%. These results suggest that a ratio of >10% for Ub indicates a wound age of at least 1 day. In contrast, Ub-positive ratios of less than 10% indicate a wound age of <1 day. Moreover, there was a significant difference in the Ub-positive ratio between group III and the other three groups. Thus, Ub-positive ratios considerably exceeding 30%, possibly indicate a wound age of 7-14 days. From the viewpoint of a forensic pathology application, the present study showed that Ub is suitable as a marker of wound age determination.
Kondo
T
T
Division of Environmental Science, Forensic and Social Environmental Medicine, Graduate School of Medical Science, Kanazawa University, Takara-machi 13-1, Kanazawa 920-8640, Japan. t-kondo@med.kanazawa-u.ac.jp
Tanaka
J
J
Ishida
Y
Y
Mori
R
R
Takayasu
T
T
Ohshima
T
T
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000818:Animals; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000032:analysis; D002648:Child; D005554:Forensic Medicine; D006801:Humans; D007150:Immunohistochemistry; D015603:Keratinocytes / Q000378:metabolism; D051379:Mice; D008875:Middle Aged; D011180:Postmortem Changes; D012867:Skin / Q000293:injuries* / Q000378:metabolism*; D013997:Time Factors; D025801:Ubiquitin / Q000378:metabolism*; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000378:metabolism / Q000473:pathology
D015415:Biomarkers; D025801:Ubiquitin