Temperature has a profound influence on the rate at which changes appear in a carcase. A very low temperature indefinitely postpones the apparent changes.
The optimum temperature seems to coincide with that which is most suitable to the activities of ferments and bacteria present in the living body. Alterations in temperature, such as occur in exposed carcases, during the day and night, probably influence putrefaction by their effects on bacterial activity, antagonism, and symbiosis. Variations in temperature conditions may produce changes more profound than would appear likely on superficial consideration. The optimum temperature for one group of organisms is different from the optimum conditions for another. Changes in temperature, therefore, especially if they are of some duration, are apt to favour some groups at the expense of others, and influence in this way the whole sequence of subsequent events.
Water is necessary to the growth of bacteria. It permits of their migration in the tissues, allows their ferments to act, distributes by diffusion the substances on which they live, and dilutes the toxic products of their activity.
The effects of temperature and moisture cannot be dissociated for it is in combination that these factors exert their greatest influence.
In a hot dry atmosphere the removal of water by evaporation may be so rapid that a small carcase may become desiccated before putrefaction has advanced far. In hot arid countries a variety of influences inimical to putrefaction are at work, especially when carcases are resting on dry sand. The strong sunlight tends to destroy the skin organisms, which we believe to be the most important agents in producing putrefaction. The skin soon becomes horny in consistency, imprisoning the organisms within it, and preventing their invasion of the tissues. The horny skin protects the carcases from moisture from any source, and the exudation of fluid finally results in mummification.
In a hot moist atmosphere sunlight is robbed of much of its bactericidal power, and the conditions most favourable to putrefaction prevail. Moisture from the air, rain water and water from the ground are absorbed and keep the skin moist. Suitable conditions for the growth and penetration of skin and soil organisms are thus created. Very soon the superficial layers of the epidermis are loosened and the sodden skin permits the autolytic enzymes, passing from the deeper parts, to exert their action on it and assist the putrefactive organisms. The aerobic conditions now prevailing in the skin aid disintegration. The protective influence of the skin is thus lost, and water has free access to the underlying tissues, where it exerts its elutriating and solvent effects. The products of putrefaction are diluted and removed and the dissemination of organisms favoured. Oxidation now plays some part in the process and disintegration proceeds rapidly. The presence of maggots seems to hasten putrefaction.
Such considerations ought to be sufficient to suggest the inadvisability of treating decomposing animal matter with watery solutions of antiseptics as is so often done. Here we may point out that the flesh can be completely macerated from the bones in six days, if a carcase is kept in water at 37° F. The progress is especially rapid, if the water is changed after three days, and the products which seem to inhibit bacterial growth removed.
Within a few days of death, the time varying with the conditions, certain phenomena are noticed if a carcase is kept under observation. It becomes distended with gas, fluid exudes from it, and the skin over certain areas becomes green. These phenomena are usually regarded as evidences of putrefaction. Since in properly treated carcases they are not followed by disintegration of the proteins, which form the main constituents of the body, and since they appear to be due partly to enzyme action and partly to the action of intestinal bacteria of the colon-type on such constituents as carbohydrates, and not to the action of putrefactive organisms, we consider that we are justified in regarding these phenomena as precursors of true putrefactive changes. By the latter term we understand the disintegration of the tissues by putrefactive organisms, a process accompanied by the elimination of foul-smelling products.
The evidence on which this conclusion is based has been given in detail in this section, and here we propose to discuss only the more important considerations.
