The Human Skeleton Can Offer More Information Than Meets The Eye

How can the age of a body be estimated using bones? What are some of the different areas of the body that may give an indication of age?

There were many factors that lead t the discovery of the skeleton owner’s gender, ethnicity, height, and age.

Over the years, several techniques involving the analysis of human skeletal remains for the purposes of ancestral classification have been developed. Many of the earliest techniques involved the visual comparison of different morphoscopic traits and subsequent classification based on the anthropologist’s subjective opinion. Although many of these non-metric techniques have been shown to be

I find the article on ‘The Skeleton Chronicles’ interesting because part of a skeleton holds so much information, just looking at the bone density of a skeleton you are able to determine if a person had a physically stressful life or if they had a life with less physical stress. Bioarchaeology is also able to determine what the political and cultural climate may have been during that time period. In addition, dental clues such as the shape, size, and formation of enamel gives us clues about how a person lived, if they were suffered from malnutrition or if they have had any infections.

Anthropologists help with identifying human remains by constructing a biological profile. They do this by estimating age, sex, stature, and ancestry, as well as identifying other characteristics such as diseases and injuries (Anđelinović et al. 2005). The anthropologists also analyze injuries that happened around the time of a person’s death which can determine the cause of death (Allmäe, Limbo-Simovart 2015). To learn these things, some questions need to be asked, such as: is it a bone? Is it human? Which bones are present? How many people are represented? Are the remains modern or

Age: There are many bones that can determine the age of an unknown victim. The sutures of the skull, the ends of the clavicle/long bones and even teeth may disclose the age. Forensic anthropologists can use ossification to determine the age of a victim.

There was a lot of information in this week’s reading. Having studied the skeletal system in previous classes, this was quite the refresher. Although I recognized a lot of the terms used to describe bones, it was very interesting to read about the basic anatomy of bones. In my reading of Bowers Chapter 2 page 46, I learned about the three anatomical categories of bone. I also learned about the three gross structures of long bones. In the past, I knew that the thigh bone was called a femur and that it was a long bone. I did not know that as along bone, its three parts were called the diaphysis, metaphysis, and epiphysis. This information was useful when I read the case study. Estimating age based on whether the epiphysis had fused or not was

3.As Time progresses, the bone will become stronger and more firmly joined at the previous sight of fracture.

The article published by the Forensic Science Central in the United Kingdom (2012), identified the various features of the human skeleton that can aid in determining the sex of the individual. Some of the features includes, but are not limited to, the pelvic bone, which is wider in female than males, and the skull, which has various ways to identify the sex. The skull is said to be equally beneficial to the pelvic bone in establishing an individual’s sex. Research shows that the skull of a male will have a more rounded supraorbital margin (brow ridge), and a bony glabella (the portion of bone between the eyebrows and nose). The male’s mastoid process that sits behind the ear is larger, and their mandible is more squared than in females. The nasal cavity of a male is longer and narrower. Oppositely, the female supraorbital margin is much sharper, and her glabella is much smoother. The female’s mastoid process is smaller in size, and the mandible is less squared. The research also stated that the female nasal cavity will be slighty wider, and pear-shaped. Another factor that may be beneficial in determining the sex of skeletal remains is racial background. The research highlighted that if the racial background is known, the sex would be easier to be

Age, is not always the most accurate thing to determine in a forensic anthropology lab. Determining a person's age is dependent on many bones. At birth, all humans have about 405 bones,

Correctly identifying the sex of skeletal remains is a forensic professional’s first and foremost priority, and usually, a complete skeleton can be rare due to issues such as environmental factors, taphonomic processes or animal scavengers. Traditionally, the bones of the pelvis and skull have been used the most commonly in estimating sex in skeletal remains, with the pubic bone being the greatest sex indicator (Klales, Ousley and Vollner, 2012). These are seen as robust and strong parts of the skeleton (especially the mandible) that have a high probability of surviving the best after long periods of time as they are protected parts of the body that can be well weathered (Kumar and Lokanadham, 2013). The pelvis and the skull are the most

These features indicate that the individual was or above the age of 30. However, the exact age at this time cannot be determined based on the bones found due to the dependence on developmental occurrences that take place conclude approximately at the age of 30 in the human pelvic girdle.

There are many factors involved in the determination of perimortem trauma time in both forensic pathology and forensic anthropology. This is critical information when it comes to legal issues or the interpretation of prehistoric bone fractures. There is an extensive difference in fracture properties that depend both on the time that has passed since death, and the type of environment where the specimen has been exposed after death.

The use of human biological remains can tell us quite a lot about how past civilizations lived. One is able to deduce from the findings whether groups of people were transient or stationary by examining findings from a midden. Refuse stashes also tell us much of what a specific group consumes in terms of diet or housing materials. One is able to discover how long ago an individual lived by using dating measurements such as radio carbon dating or argon dating. The use of human biological remains is the most beneficial and educational resource for archeologists in the field and in the laboratory.

Skeletal ossification is the process whereby soft spots of the skeleton and skull fill with minerals and harden. This skeletal development, however, varies at birth and at age 12 between boys and girls. As a general trend, girls mature faster than boys and thus have an older skeletal age. At birth, girls