Forensic DNA Analysis of Burned Bones: Current Research Status and Future Perspectives

Burned skeletal remains are often critical evidence for human identification in fires, deliberate burning, aircraft accidents, explosions, and similar events because bone persists under extreme thermal conditions. However, extensive DNA degradation caused by high-temperature burning poses a major challenge to conventional short tandem repeat (STR) profiling. In recent years, DNA hybridization capture has emerged as a promising molecular approach for enriching target fragments from highly degraded samples, offering new opportunities to overcome key limitations in DNA analysis of burned bone. This review summarizes the mechanisms by which high-temperature burning alters the physicochemical properties of bone and affects DNA preservation. Particular emphasis is placed on multilevel thermal changes across temperature ranges, including collagen denaturation, hydroxyapatite crystal reorganization, DNA strand fragmentation, and chemical modification. On this basis, we review the current workflow for forensic DNA analysis of burned bone, including skeletal element selection, decontamination and bone powder preparation, decalcification strategies, silica-based extraction and purification, STR profiling, and high-throughput sequencing (HTS). We further discuss the differential applicability of complete and incomplete decalcification protocols for burned bone samples, the advantages of ancient DNA (aDNA) extraction methods for highly charred remains, and the forensic utility of automated extraction systems. Given the extremely low DNA yield, severe fragmentation, inhibitor interference, and lack of standardized protocols associated with extensively burned samples, this review also evaluates the potential of DNA hybridization capture and targeted enrichment technologies. Because hybridization capture does not require intact double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) templates and can efficiently recover target sequences from ultrashort DNA fragments, it may be particularly well suited to burned skeletal material, although the current forensic evidence base remains limited. This review provides an integrated overview of burned bone DNA analysis, from thermal damage mechanisms to targeted enrichment strategies, and highlights how hybridization capture may extend forensic practice beyond identification toward DNA phenotyping.