The postmortem diagnosis of hypothermia fatalities is often complex due to the absence of pathognomonic lesions and biomarkers. In this study, potential novel biomarkers of hypothermia fatalities were searched in the vitreous humor of known cases of hypothermia fatalities (n = 20) compared to control cases (n = 16), using a targeted metabolomics approach allowing quantitative detection of 188 metabolites. A robust discriminant model with good predictivity was obtained with the supervised OPLS-DA multivariate analysis, showing a distinct separation between the hypothermia and control groups. This signature was characterized by the decreased concentrations of five metabolites (methionine sulfoxide, tryptophan, phenylalanine, alanine, and ornithine) and the increased concentration of 28 metabolites (21 phosphatidylcholines, 3 sphingomyelins, spermine, citrulline, acetylcarnitine, and hydroxybutyrylcarnitine) in hypothermia fatalities compared to controls. The signature shows similarities with already identified features in serum such as the altered concentrations of tryptophan, acylcarnitines, and unsaturated phosphatidylcholines, revealing a highly significant increased activity of methionine sulfoxide reductase, attested by a low methionine sulfoxide-to-methionine ratio. Our results show a preliminary metabolomics signature of hypothermia fatalities in the vitreous humor, highlighting an increased methionine sulfoxide reductase activity.
Keywords: biomarkers; forensic; hypothermia; lipidomics; metabolomics; vitreous humor.