[Enzymatic study of esterase-D in cadaver blood]

Two hundred and sixty cadaver blood hemolysates were examined. Death had occurred from several hours to 20 days before. The most common phenotype was EsD1 (in 83,46 per cent of the samples), followed by ESD2-1 (15--72 per cent) and EsD2 (0,77 per cent). The gene frequency of EsD1 was 0.9135 and of EsD2--0.0865. It was compared with the gene frequencies of adult Bulgarian population--EsD1--0.8976 and EsD2--0.1024 (1660 persons examined); the differences are insignificant. The phenotypes were correlated with the theoretically expected distribution, using the Hi-square criterion; the difference proved to be accidental (P less than 0.05). In altogether preserved cadavers, regardless of the cause and time of death, enzyme EsD phenotypes were well expressed. In advanced cadaver decomposition fluorescence activity was reduced.