McKee J K, Molnar S
Department of Anatomy, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Republic of South Africa.
Arch Oral Biol. 1988;33(12):901-6. doi: 10.1016/0003-9969(88)90020-9.
The ability to describe dental arch shape is necessary for biomechanical studies of occlusion as well as for anthropological studies of human and primate dental variation. A mathematical method of describing and classifying human dental arch shape was used to assess the nature of individual variability. The method involved the calculation of a series of third-degree polynomials which were fitted to coordinate points along the dental arcade. The slopes of the polynomials, evaluated at these coordinate points, provided a multivariate description of shape, independent of arch size. Graphic representations of arch shape could be constructed from the polynomial equations. These mathematical techniques were used in association with multivariate and univariate statistics to explore the types of variability in dental arch shape among a population of Australian aborigines. The results illustrated the ambiguities of conventional subjective classifications.
描述牙弓形状的能力对于咬合的生物力学研究以及人类和灵长类牙齿变异的人类学研究而言是必要的。一种描述和分类人类牙弓形状的数学方法被用于评估个体变异性的本质。该方法涉及计算一系列三次多项式，这些多项式被拟合到沿牙弓的坐标点。在这些坐标点处评估的多项式斜率提供了形状的多变量描述，与牙弓大小无关。牙弓形状的图形表示可以从多项式方程构建。这些数学技术与多变量和单变量统计结合使用，以探索澳大利亚原住民群体中牙弓形状的变异类型。结果说明了传统主观分类的模糊性。
