Análise das suturas cranianas e palatinas para estimativa de idade – uma contribuição para a antropologia forense

Abstract

Forensic Anthropology is an area of knowledge that applies techniques to determine the identity of an individual. The evaluation of the biological profile is one of the priority objectives in an examination of forensic anthropology. It allows the diagnosis of gender, profiling ethnic-racial affinities and age-to-death of individuals based on analyses of macroscopic characteristics in human skeletons. The objective of this study was to characterize the biological identification of individuals through the analysis of the cranial and palatine sutures and the measurement of the condylar index of each skull of the sample, which will allow to estimate the probable age at death and sex, respectively. We analysed 21 skulls of adult individuals from the collection of the Human Anatomy Laboratory of UniCesumar. Measurements were made with a digital caliper. The results were: through cranial sutures of 15 sample components, an average of 39.2 years of age on death, based on platinum sutures of 16, 1 skull between 25-43 years, 12 skulls between 43-60 years and 3 over 60 years, and through the condylar indices, 7 female and 2 male skulls, 12 were not possible to estimate sex. From the total sample of 6 skulls it was not possible to analyse the cranial sutures and 5 the palatine sutures. Based on the application and results obtained, it was possible to establish the relevance of such methods as contributors to forensic anthropology since it allows to identify an individual from his skeleton through simple and non-costly practices.