title: Pilot study to establish a nasal tip prediction method from unknown human skeletal remains for facial reconstruction and skull photo superimposition as applied to a Japanese male populations.
abstract: Skull-photo superimposition is a technique used to identify the relationship between the skull and a photograph of a target person: and facial reconstruction reproduces antemortem facial features from an unknown human skull, or identifies the facial features of unknown human skeletal remains. These techniques are based on soft tissue thickness and the relationships between soft tissue and the skull, i.e., the position of the ear and external acoustic meatus, pupil and orbit, nose and nasal aperture, and lips and teeth. However, the ear and nose region are relatively difficult to identify because of their structure, as the soft tissues of these regions are lined with cartilage. We attempted to establish a more accurate method to determine the position of the nasal tip from the skull. We measured the height of the maxilla and mid-lower facial region in 55 Japanese men and generated a regression equation from the collected data. We obtained a result that was 2.0±0.99mm (mean±SD) distant from the true nasal tip, when applied to a validation set consisting of another 12 Japanese men.
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Forensic Dentistry, Graduate School of Medical and Dental Sciences, Tokyo Medical and Dental University, 1-5-45 Yushima Bunkyou-ku, Tokyo 113-8510, Japan; Dept. of Legal Medicine, School of Medicine, Tokyo Women's Medical University, 8-1 Kawada-cho, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 162-8666, Japan. Electronic address: hazimeu.fde@tmd.ac.jp.
authors.forename: Hajime
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Utsuno
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Orthodontics, Matsumoto Dental University, School of Dentistry, 1780 Gobara Hirooka, Shiojiri, Nagano 399-0781, Japan.
authors.forename: Toru
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kageyama
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Oral Radiology, Matsumoto Dental University, School of Dentistry, Nagano 399-0781, Japan.
authors.forename: Keiichi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Uchida
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Legal Medicine, School of Medicine, Tokyo Women's Medical University, 8-1 Kawada-cho, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 162-8666, Japan.
authors.forename: Kazuhiko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kibayashi
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Forensic Dentistry, Graduate School of Medical and Dental Sciences, Tokyo Medical and Dental University, 1-5-45 Yushima Bunkyou-ku, Tokyo 113-8510, Japan.
authors.forename: Koichi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Sakurada
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Forensic Medicine, Graduate School of Medical and Dental Sciences, Tokyo Medical and Dental University, 1-5-45 Yushima Bunkyou-ku, Tokyo 113-8510, Japan.
authors.forename: Koichi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Uemura
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D044466:Asian People; D002508:Cephalometry; D018732:Forensic Anthropology / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D007564:Japan; D008297:Male; D009666:Nose / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D010781:Photography; D010865:Pilot Projects; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012886:Skull / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Cephalometric X-ray images; Facial reconstruction; Forensic anthropology; Nasal tip prediction; Skull – photo superimposition