Krishan Kewal, Kumar Raj
Department of Anthropology, Panjab University, Chandigarh 160 014, India.
Leg Med (Tokyo). 2007 May;9(3):128-33. doi: 10.1016/j.legalmed.2006.12.001. Epub 2007 Feb 15.
A forensic medicine specialist, while a conducting medico-legal autopsy, is often asked to opine about the identity of the deceased in unknown fragmentary and dismembered remains. Determination of stature is an important aspect in establishing identity in such cases. Sometimes, cephalo-facial remains are brought for postmortem and forensic examination. The aim of the present study was to estimate the stature from cephalo-facial dimensions in a sample of 252 Koli male adolescents from North India. As a part of Indian caste system, Kolis are an endogamous group of North India. Along with stature, sixteen cephalo-facial measurements were taken on each subject. The findings suggest that all the cephalo-facial measurements are significantly correlated with stature (P<0.001, P<0.01); the measurements of the cephalic region have strong correlation with stature than those of the facial region. This was also supported by the regression analysis, which shows that the cephalic measurements give better prediction of stature. Reliability of the regression formulae was checked by comparing the estimated and actual stature within the same sample (genetically homogeneous population, n=252) and in another sample taken from a mixed population of North India (genetically heterogeneous population, n=90).
法医专家在进行法医尸检时，经常会被要求对身份不明、残缺不全和肢解的遗体的死者身份发表意见。在这类案件中，确定身高是确定身份的一个重要方面。有时，会将头部和面部遗体送去进行尸检和法医检查。本研究的目的是根据印度北部252名科利族男性青少年样本的头部和面部尺寸来估计身高。作为印度种姓制度的一部分，科利族是印度北部的一个内部通婚群体。除了身高，还对每个受试者进行了16项头部和面部测量。研究结果表明，所有头部和面部测量值与身高均显著相关（P<0.001，P<0.01）；头部区域的测量值与身高的相关性比面部区域的测量值更强。回归分析也支持了这一点，该分析表明头部测量值对身高的预测更好。通过比较同一样本（基因同质群体，n=252）以及从印度北部混合群体中抽取的另一个样本（基因异质群体，n=90）中的估计身高和实际身高，检验了回归公式的可靠性。
