Forensic microbiology and bite marks: a systematic review

The forensic role of microbiology in bite mark analysis as evidence in a court of law has not yet been explored, as the analysis of bite marks is mostly morphology-based. The aim of this systematic review is to investigate if the analysis of the oral microbiota may be helpful as a complementary forensic tool. Articles were searched on the PubMed database, using predefined data fields and keywords. The final selection included a total of 6 papers (out of 42). Our results indicated that the Streptococcus genus is a key player in the analysis of bite mark microbiology from a forensic perspective and its genomic analysis may facilitate the association of a bite mark to the perpetrator. However, much more research is still needed before this forensic strategy can be applied in real scenarios. There is a need to optimize and standardize the methods of microbiome analysis and to determine several factors that may influence the results, such as the frequency of bacterial genotypes in the human population and the temporal stability of the oral microbiome on human skin.