forensic anthropology. definition: an applied area of physical anthropology role: to assist law...
TRANSCRIPT
Forensic Anthropology
Forensic Anthropology
• Definition: An applied area of physical anthropology
• Role: To assist law enforcement agencies in a medico legal context
General Goals
• 1. Establish biological profile: age, sex, race, height
• 2. Determine time since death – (PMI- post mortem interval)
• 3. Examine remains for signs of trauma
• 4. Establish positive identity
Who do they work with?
• Police Departments• Sheriff’s Offices• Office of the Attorney General• Coroner’s offices• FBI• ATF• Private individuals
Estimating Age• Skull features
• Dentition
• Epiphysial fusion of long bones
Skull Features…• The cranium (the skull minus the
lower jaw bone, or mandible)
• consists of 28 bones. (6 unpaired bone, and 8 paired bones, plus 3 ear bones on each side)
• Some bones are paired, which means there is a left and right one, and some bones are unpaired, meaning there is just one.
• Neonate – Newborn = first 28 days after birth• The mandible is more commonly known as the lower jaw bone. • It is the strongest bone of the face • The mandible is two separate bones (left and right) that fuse together to
form one bone.
DENTITION
• Teeth can be divided into maxillary (upper) and mandibular (lower)
• There are four different categories of teeth: incisors, canines, premolars, and molars.
• Adults will usually have a total of 32 teeth.
• The function of each tooth is different. Incisors are designed for cutting, canines are pointed for tearing, and premolars and molars are designed for grinding and reducing food.
The Hyoid
• Small, horn-shaped bone that supports the tongue, and gives attachment to many muscles in speech.
• This bone is of particular interest to forensic anthropologists as it is commonly broken in cases of strangulation.
• Unfused hyphoid. This fuses at about 35 years of age.
Long Bones• Humerus - your upper arm
bone
• Ulna/Radius - your lower arm bones
• Femur – your thigh bone. It is the largest of all bones
• Tibia & Fibula - two bones that make up your lower leg– tibia is known as the shin bone,
and it is the second largest bone in the body
Radius & UlnaHumerus
FEMUR Fibula & Tibia
Determining Sex
• Skull features
• Pelvic Bone Characteristics
• Analysis of Femur
• Dentition
A baby's skeleton has 350 bones, but many of these fuse to give an adult a total of 206 bones. A man's skeleton has broader shoulders than a woman's, a longer ribcage, and a pelvic girdle for walking/running. A woman's skeleton has the same bone complement as a man's but is slightly smaller and less robust, with a wider pelvic opening to assist childbirth.
Skull Features
FEATURE MEN WOMEN
Cranial Mass Blocky & MassiveDeeper
Rounder & Tapers at the Top
Brow Ridge Margin is rounder & dull Margin is sharper
Zygomatic Bone More Pronounced Less Pronounced
Mandible (lower jaw)
Square Shaped Rounded Shape
Supercilary Arch More Pronounced & larger
Less Pronounced & smaller
Pelvic Bone Characteristics
• The innominate bones are irregular in shape– AKA: Hip Bone– the large bone in the hip,
consisting of the ilium, the ischium, and the pubic bone.
• They are the best means of determining the SEX of a skeleton
FEMALE MALE
Analysis of the Femur
• Typically longer in men
• Women’s bones stop developing around 18
• Men’s bones develop until about 21
• Men have more bone mass
Determining Race
• Caucasoid characteristics: Oval eye orbits, Narrow nasal opening
• Negroid characteristics: square eye orbit, greater breadth at nose, protruding teeth
• Mongoloid: in between the two. Native Americans have “shoveled” teeth.
RACE IS THE HARDEST TO IDENTIFY
Caucasoid
American Negroid
Native American
Determining Time Since Death
• Decay of epidermis and/or skeleton
• Articulation & scattering of remains
• Material Remains??•Clothing•Objects
Postmortem Interval - PMI
• Antemortem trauma: Before death
• Perimortem trauma: at or around the time of death
• Post mortem trauma: after death
Femur with animal chew marks on either end
Cause of Death• Can be homicide, suicide, accidental, natural, and unknown
• Easier with a fleshed body and often very difficult with flesh and organs gone
• Look for things like depressions and indentations caused by blunt trauma, lead fragments, etc.