Modern software is now allowing researchers to gain insight into the origin of our ancestors—taking a new look at old bones. Forensic anthropologist and associate professor Ann Ross has developed this technology, called 3D-ID, with the help of scientific computing researcher Dennis Slice of Florida State University.
According to Ross, 3D-ID can give information about a person’s sex and ancestral background solely on the measurements of the skull.
“3D-ID is a software that we developed as a shareware for the forensic scientists,” Ross said. “We started working on this back in 2005.”
3D-ID performs shape analysis using geometric morphometrics , which is a field of study that characterizes and evaluates the biological forms. Prior to using 3D-ID, the forensic practitioner had to take measurements of 34 specific points on the skull using a 3D digitizer, which is an electronic pen-like instrument that reads the coordinates of each of these points. The 3D-ID analyzes these measurements to determine the ancestry and sex of the skull.
“The purpose of [3D-ID] is to measure the x, y and z coordinates [using digitizer] from the anatomical landmarks on the skull,” Ross said. “You can then plug-in this data into the software and it will give you a classification of what the most closely related population the skull belongs to. For example it can tell you if its a Meso-American male or a European female.”
The 3D-ID compares the measurements of the digitizer with a reference database to provide information about the skull.
“Right now we have about 1,300 individuals in this database from all over the world,” Ross said. “And we keep collecting and incorporating new data into the software program.”
According to Ross, the grouping of the population has been done a little differently in 3D-ID than how it is normally done in the forensic sciences.
“A lot of times we use the term Hispanic, which has no biological meaning,” Ross said. “So we have grouped the population according to the geographic regions. For example, we have Circum-Caribbean , Meso-Americans , South Americans. We have also differentiated European Americans from Europeans, African Americans from Africans.”
The next step, according to Ross, is to include juvenile skeletons in 3D-ID so the software can help with the growing cases of missing children in America.
“We have currently not included the data that will help determining the ancestry of a juvenile,” Ross said. “But through the research we have done [at the University], we used the 3D-ID for identifying the skeleton of an unidentified boy in a case from 1998 and we were able to say that he is Meso-American.”
According to Ross, the new 3D-ID will be a multidisciplinary technology, helping assist in missing persons investigations and other legal and medical cases. The next research breakthrough will be making it onto CSI.
