Naked Science Forum
Life Sciences => Cells, Microbes & Viruses => Topic started by: thedoc on 01/08/2016 13:23:02
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McCollonough asked the Naked Scientists:
I am writing a fictional story in which one person "stuffs" the body of his dead wife with bags of dugs and money. I need to know how this would effect the way the body looked when discovered 70 years later.
What do you think?
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If the drugs were stereotypically wrapped in latex condoms, then I don't think they would survive 70 years : the rubber would perish.
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The body would decay much faster than 70 years, so after perhaps 1 year in the soil, there would be a skeleton, with scraps of hair, skin, nails (and anything else that insect larvae find indigestible) and clothes - plus the sealed money and drugs.
Scraps of the body may last a bit longer in a coffin.
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decomposition
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Putrefaction
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See Iggy Pop.
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Unless it was frozen, irradiated or embalmed, the soft tissues of the body would disintegrate in a matter of months, but sterile organic material wrapped in oilcloth or tin cans can survive 100 years or so.