Trends in the analysis of abrin poisoning for forensic purposes.

Spriha Sharma, Gurleen Kaur, Adarsh Kumar, Rajinder Singh

Journal of forensic and legal medicine 2023 Aug

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Abrus precatorius is a poisonous plant known since ancient times. Accidental poisoning is more common due to the intake of plant seeds containing deadly abrin which is a highly toxic and a thermolabile plant toxalbumin. Abrin has also been reported to be a potential chemical agent that can be used as bioweapon in military or terrorism. Abrin is a ribosome inactivating protein that contains multiple isotoxic forms of protein subunits called chain A and B. The identification of this toxalbumin in the plant is important to determine cause of death in poisoning cases. Therefore, the present review focuses on the structure, mode of administration, tokicokinetics, extraction procedures and forensic analysis of abrin and other constituents. It is observed that most of the researchers have utilized immunological methods for the detection of plant components. This technique has proved to be more sensitive, reliable and accurate for the detection of extremely low concentrations of toxin. Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Ltd and Faculty of Forensic and Legal Medicine. All rights reserved.

Citation

Spriha Sharma, Gurleen Kaur, Adarsh Kumar, Rajinder Singh. Trends in the analysis of abrin poisoning for forensic purposes. Journal of forensic and legal medicine. 2023 Aug;98:102564