Study on the criteria for assessing skull-face correspondence in craniofacial superimposition

Abstract

Study on the criteria for assessing skull-face correspondence in craniofacial superimposition, Legal Medicine (2016), doi: http://dx.doi.org/10. 1016/j.legalmed.2016.09.009 This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain. AbstractCraniofacial superimposition has the potential to be used as an identification method when other traditional biological techniques are not applicable due to insufficient quality or absence of ante-mortem and post-mortem data. Despite having been used in many countries as a method of inclusion and exclusion for over a century it lacks standards. Thus, the purpose of this research is to provide forensic practitioners with standard criteria for analysing skull-face relationships. Thirty-seven experts from 16 different institutions participated in this study, which consisted of evaluating 65 criteria for assessing skull-face anatomical consistency on a sample of 24 different skull-face superimpositions. An unbiased statistical analysis established the most objective and discriminative criteria. Results did not show strong associations, however, important insights to address lack of standards were provided. In addition, a novel methodology for understanding and standardizing identification methods based on the observation of morphological patterns has been proposed.

Handbook on Craniofacial Superimposition

“…The low correlation values could be also explained through the different SFO obtained by the participants. As pointed out in the first study (Ibáñez et al 2014b), that of course had a clear influence on the analysis of the morphological relationship. A common problem that still affects MEPROCS framework is the absence of an objective evaluation of the resulting SFO.…”

“…At this point, it is important to note one important difference between the types of identification scenarios presented in both studies. While in the current study, there are at least two AM photographs in 27 of the 32 CFS problems, in the study subject for comparison (Ibáñez et al 2014b), only 4 of a total of 60 CFS problems involve the comparison of more than one AM photograph.…”

“…Although the proposed methodologies for achieving an optimal and unbiased SFO (Ibáñez et al 2015) and for the analysis of the criteria for assessing skull-face correspondence in craniofacial superimposition (Ibáñez et al 2014a) were themselves a great achievement, the conclusions drawn in the criteria study, as pointed out by the authors, were influenced by the materials employed (i.e., cone-beam CTs that lacked the upper part of the skull and presented additional inconveniences), and more thorough studies have to be developed. The low correlation values could be also explained through the different SFO obtained by the participants.…”

Past progress and future needs of forensic anthropology in India

“…23 Notably, research reports from India were found to be useful when collating the performance of different superimposition approaches. 24…”

Hierarchical information fusion for decision making in craniofacial superimposition

“…MEPROCS work group also discussed and quantitatively analyzed these criteria for the evaluation of the morphological skull-face correspondence, providing a set of the most discriminative and easy to assess criteria [24].…”