Lavelle C L
Br J Orthod. 1984 Apr;11(2):69-74. doi: 10.1179/bjo.11.2.69.
The technique of medial axis transformation of the outline form was used for the specific analysis of mandibular shape. When used to compare mandibular shape derived from lateral cephalographs between three equal samples of 30 female patients aged 12-15 years, marked overall similarity was noted between patients with Classes I, II and III occlusions. There were however subtle contrasts including the degree of coronoid and condylar separation and orientation of the ramus relative to the corpus. Such constancy of mandibular form derived from this technique of investigation was marked contrast to the data of traditional cephalometric studies which combine both size and shape parameters together. This study therefore demonstrated that shape appears less variable than size.
采用轮廓形态的中轴线变换技术对下颌骨形状进行具体分析。当用于比较12 - 15岁的30名女性患者的三个相等样本的头颅侧位片得出的下颌骨形状时，I类、II类和III类咬合患者之间存在明显的总体相似性。然而，也存在细微差异，包括冠状突和髁突的分离程度以及下颌支相对于下颌体的方向。通过这种研究技术得出的下颌骨形态的这种稳定性与传统头影测量研究的数据形成了鲜明对比，传统头影测量研究将大小和形状参数结合在一起。因此，本研究表明，形状的变异性似乎小于大小。
