Experts are due to examine part of a wing that washed up on the island of Reunion last week and is thought to have belonged to missing flight MH370.
The Boeing 777 piece has been taken to Toulouse in south-west France.
An Australian transport expert is helping out in the examination at the invitation of the French authorities. Malaysian experts are also attending.
They may pronounce on the origin of the wing part either on Wednesday or later this week, officials say.
For reasons that remain unclear the Malaysia Airlines plane veered off course on its way to Beijing in March 2014 and crashed into the sea with 239 people on board.
Investigators hope to be able to determine the speed at which MH370 hit the water, and use that information to advise search teams to look for a plane that remains largely intact, or one that disintegrated on impact.
Experts are due to examine part of a wing that washed up on the island of Reunion last week.
The Boeing 777 piece whihas been taken to Toulouse in south-west France thought to have belonged to missing flight MH370.
Attending to the examination will be French and Malaysian experts, Boeing employees and representatives from China – the country that lost most passengers in the disaster.
Jean-Paul Troadec, the former head of the French BEA agency that investigates air accidents, was quoted by AFP as saying that the examination would concentrate on two issues – whether the wing part belongs to MH370 and if so, whether it can provide any information on the final moments of the plane.
French officials say analysis of a piece of debris that experts believe could be from the missing flight MH370 wili be conducted on Wednesday.
The object, believed to be part of a wing, was flown to the French capital from Reunion in the Indian Ocean and transported by road to a defence ministry laboratory in Toulouse for analysis.
The military laboratory is expected to verify the serial number of the object and conduct further tests.
Fragments of a suitcase found on the same beach are also to be examined.
The Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 travelling from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing vanished in March 2014. There were 239 passengers and crew on board.
Technical experts in France will on Wednesday begin examining a plane part that almost certainly belonged to missing flight MH370, raising hopes that some light may finally be shed on one of aviation’s darkest mysteries.
Last week’s discovery of a two-metre-long wing part called a flaperon on the French Indian Ocean island of Réunion raised fresh hopes for relatives desperate for answers.
The piece – which has been confirmed as part of a Boeing 777 – has been taken to the southwestern French city of Toulouse, where it will undergo the high-profile examination.
The only missing Boeing 777 in the world is flight MH370. It is also thought to be the only 777 ever to have crashed in the southern hemisphere.
