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THE BIOLOGICAL PROFILE

المؤلف:  Max M. Houck، Jay A. Siegel

المصدر:  Fundamentals of Forensic Science

الجزء والصفحة:  195

2026-07-15

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THE BIOLOGICAL PROFILE

Once the remains are determined to be human, then a biological profile can be developed for the individual(s) represented. The biological profile consists of assessing the sex, age at death, racial affinity, height, and any other aspects that would describe the individual-class-level information. The biological profile is the first step toward identifying whom the remains represent. It is a waste of time to immediately start comparing the dental X-rays or sequencing DNA samples of a 20-year-old woman when the bones recovered are from a 50-year-old man. Which bones are present and their quality will determine what methods can be applied and, in part, the accuracy of those methods. The criteria that help determine the biological profile are either qualitative, that is, morphological (the presence or absence of a trait, or the shape or size of a landmark) or quantitative. Physical anthropologists use many different measurements as a way of discriminating among individuals, samples, and populations. Some of these information have been catalogued (e.g., at the University of Tennessee’s Forensic Data Bank) and used to provide virtual “comparative collections” of measurements that can be used by anyone with a computer (FORDISC is an example of commercially available software for forensic anthropologists). As more museums and universities surrender their osteological collections for repatriation and reburial, collections of data instead of bones will become increasingly crucial to future anthropologists’ research. Quantitative physical anthropology is dominated by statistical analysis and sometimes these analyzes, such as principal component analysis, are quite complex involving many measurements, samples, and relationships.