We prospectively monitored the postmortem course of interleukin-1beta (IL-1beta), soluble interleukin-2 receptor (sIL-2R) and lipopolysaccharide binding protein (LBP) in septic and non-septic fatalities to evaluate their potential as biochemical postmortem markers of sepsis. Serum concentrations were determined by chemiluminescent immunometric assays. In both the sepsis group and the control group a postmortem increase of IL-1beta levels with the progression of time after death was observed, in both groups mainly starting from the reference concentration of healthy individuals (5 pg/ml) and with no significant differences at later time points postmortem. SIL-2R (reference limit 1,000 U/ml) was highly elevated in all individuals included in the sepsis group at all time points postmortem with statistically significant differences between the sepsis and control groups (p
