The investigating agencies have been finding it difficult to find out the cause of death whenever a body was recovered from a water body and it had no scientific base to come to any conclusion in cases where bodies were recovered after years, months and week. Problems are faced by the investigating agencies to know the exact cause of death in case where body is putrefied/decomposed/skeletonised/recovered from the water body or having being transported to the place by drifting along the waves of water. Perpetrators of crime find it easy to dump the deceased body in water and simulate it to be death due to drowning.
In such cases diatom test is the only test which plays a role to generate an evidence of death due to drowning or otherwise. Diatoms are microscopic algae which are present in all aquatic environments. Whenever there is drowning, the diatoms along with the water enter the blood circulation and reach the distant organs like bone marrow. The biological sample as well as the water sample from the place from where the dead body was recovered is then brought to the laboratory where upon acid digestion, centrifugation and microscopy, presence or absence of diatoms are studied under phase contrast microscopy.
Forensic science, Diatoms, drowning, crime scene
