Center of Bone Biology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia.
Department of Radiology, School of Dental Medicine, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia.
Forensic Sci Int. 2023 Nov;352:111851. doi: 10.1016/j.forsciint.2023.111851. Epub 2023 Oct 2.
Although various methods for age-at-death estimation of skeletal remains are available, this is still an unsolved issue in forensic anthropology, especially concerning elderly individuals. Moreover, the lack of population-specific methods often made age-at-death estimation unreliable in other populations.
Our study aimed to examine whether micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) analysis of pubic bone samples obtained from the contemporary Serbian population could be used in anthropological and forensic practice for age-at-death estimation.
This study encompassed 62 pubic samples obtained from 26 adult male and 36 adult female cadaveric donors (age range: 22-91 years). Initially, staging according to the Suchey-Brooks phases was performed by two experienced investigators, followed by micro-CT assessment of pubic bone trabecular and cortical compartments (spatial resolution of the scans was 10 µm).
Our results revealed an age-associated decline in trabecular and cortical micro-architecture of elderly male and female individuals, with the most prominent changes present in trabecular bone volume fraction and total porosity of the anterior and posterior cortical surface of the pubic bone. Those parameters were used to generate age-at-death estimation equations. One sample t-test did not reveal a significant difference between estimated age-at-death and real (known) age-at-death in the overall sample (mean absolute error [MAE] of 4.76 years), female (MAE of 9.66 years) and male cadaveric donors (MAE of 6.10 years, p > 0.05).
Our data indicated that micro-architectural features of trabecular and cortical compartments of pubic bone could potentially be applied as an additional reliable method for age-at-death estimation in the Serbian population.
尽管有多种方法可用于估算骨骼遗骸的年龄，但这在法医人类学中仍然是一个尚未解决的问题，尤其是在涉及老年人的情况下。此外，由于缺乏特定人群的方法，在其他人群中进行年龄估计往往不可靠。
本研究旨在探讨从当代塞尔维亚人群中获取的耻骨样本的微计算机断层扫描（micro-CT）分析是否可用于人类学和法医学实践中的年龄估计。
本研究纳入了 62 个耻骨样本，来自 26 名成年男性和 36 名成年女性尸体供体（年龄范围：22-91 岁）。首先，由两名经验丰富的调查员根据 Suchey-Brooks 分期进行分期，然后对耻骨骨小梁和皮质腔进行 micro-CT 评估（扫描的空间分辨率为 10 μm）。
我们的结果显示，老年男性和女性个体的骨小梁和皮质微观结构与年龄相关的下降，耻骨骨小梁体积分数和前、后皮质表面总孔隙率的变化最为明显。这些参数被用于生成年龄估计方程。在整个样本中，个体估计年龄与实际（已知）年龄之间的差异没有统计学意义（平均绝对误差[MAE]为 4.76 岁），女性（MAE 为 9.66 岁）和男性尸体供体（MAE 为 6.10 岁，p>0.05）。
我们的数据表明，耻骨骨小梁和皮质腔的微观结构特征可能被用作估算塞尔维亚人群年龄的另一种可靠方法。
