Gonçalves David, d'Oliveira Coelho João, Acosta Maria A, Coelho Catarina, Curate Francisco, Ferreira Maria Teresa, Gouveia Márcia, Makhoul Calil, Pinto Débora, Oliveira-Santos Inês, Vassalo Ana R, Navega David, Cunha Eugénia
Research Centre for Anthropology and Health (CIAS), Department of Life Sciences, University of Coimbra, Calçada Martim Freitas, Coimbra, 3000-456, Portugal.
Archaeosciences Laboratory, Directorate General for Cultural Heritage and LARC/CIBIO/InBIO, Rua da Bica do Marquês 2, Lisboa, 1300-087, Portugal.
Am J Phys Anthropol. 2016 Jul;160(3):427-32. doi: 10.1002/ajpa.22979. Epub 2016 Apr 5.
Complete and accurate human skeletal inventory is seldom possible in archaeological and forensic cases involving severe fragmentation. In such cases, skeletal mass comparisons with published references may be used as an alternative to assess skeletal completeness but they are too general for a case-by-case routine analysis. The objective is to solve this issue by creating linear regression equations to estimate the total mass of a skeleton based on the mass of individual bones.
Total adult skeletal mass and individual mass of the clavicle, humerus, femur, patella, carpal, metacarpal, tarsal, and metatarsal bones were recorded in a sample of 60 skeletons from the 21st century identified skeletal collection (University of Coimbra). The sample included 32 females and 28 males with ages ranging from 31 to 96 years (mean = 76.4; sd = 14.8). Skeletal mass linear regression equations were calculated based on this sample.
The mass of individual bones was successfully used to predict the approximate total mass of the adult skeleton. The femur, humerus, and second metacarpal were the best predictors of total skeletal mass with root mean squared errors ranging from 292.9 to 346.1 g.
Linear regression was relatively successful at estimating adult skeletal mass. The non-normal distribution of the sample in terms of mass may have reduced the predictive power of the equations. These results have clear impact for bioanthropology, especially forensic anthropology, since this method may provide better estimates of the completeness of the skeleton or the minimum number of individuals. Am J Phys Anthropol 160:427-432, 2016. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
在涉及严重破碎的考古和法医案例中，很少能够完成完整且准确的人类骨骼清点。在此类案例中，与已发表参考文献进行骨骼质量比较可作为评估骨骼完整性的一种替代方法，但对于逐案的常规分析而言，这些参考文献过于宽泛。目的是通过创建线性回归方程，根据个体骨骼的质量来估计骨骼的总质量，从而解决这一问题。
记录了来自21世纪已鉴定骨骼收藏（科英布拉大学）的60具骨骼样本中成年骨骼的总质量以及锁骨、肱骨、股骨、髌骨、腕骨、掌骨、跗骨和跖骨的个体质量。样本包括32名女性和28名男性，年龄范围为31至96岁（平均=76.4；标准差=14.8）。基于该样本计算了骨骼质量线性回归方程。
个体骨骼的质量成功用于预测成年骨骼的大致总质量。股骨、肱骨和第二掌骨是总骨骼质量的最佳预测指标，均方根误差范围为292.9至346.1克。
线性回归在估计成年骨骼质量方面相对成功。样本在质量方面的非正态分布可能降低了方程的预测能力。这些结果对生物人类学，尤其是法医人类学具有明显影响，因为这种方法可以更好地估计骨骼的完整性或个体的最小数量。《美国体质人类学杂志》160:427 - 432，2016年。©2016威利期刊公司。
