Large-scale in-vivo Caucasian facial soft tissue thickness database for craniofacial reconstruction

A large-scale study of facial soft tissue depths of Caucasian adults was conducted. Over a 2-years period, 967 Caucasian subjects of both sexes, varying age and varying body mass index (BMI) were studied. A user-friendly and mobile ultrasound-based system was used to measure, in about 20min per subject, the soft tissue thickness at 52 facial landmarks including most of the landmarks used in previous studies. This system was previously validated on repeatability and accuracy [S. De Greef, P. Claes, W. Mollemans, M. Loubele, D. Vandermeulen, P. Suetens, G. Willems, Semi-automated ultrasound facial soft tissue depth registration: method and validation. J. Forensic Sci. 50 (2005)]. The data of 510 women and 457 men were analyzed in order to update facial soft tissue depth charts of the contemporary Caucasian adult. Tables with the average thickness values for each landmark as well as the standard deviation and range, tabulated according to gender, age and BMI are reported. In addition, for each landmark and for both sexes separately, a multiple linear regression of thickness versus age and BMI is calculated. The lateral asymmetry of the face was analysed on an initial subset of 588 subjects showing negligible differences and thus warranting the unilateral measurements of the remaining subjects. The new dataset was statistically compared to three datasets for the Caucasian adults: the traditional datasets of Rhine and Moore [J.S. Rhine, C.E. Moore, Tables of facial tissue thickness of American Caucasoids in forensic anthropology. Maxwell Museum Technical series 1 (1984)] and Helmer [R. Helmer, Schädelidentifizierung durch elektronische bildmischung, Kriminalistik Verlag GmbH, Heidelberg, 1984] together with the most recent in vivo study by Manhein et al. [M.H. Manhein, G.A. Listi, R.E. Barsley, R. Musselman, N.E. Barrow, D.H. Ubelbaker, In vivo facial tissue depth measurements for children and adults. J. Forensic Sci. 45 (2000) 48-60]. The large-scale database presented in this paper offers a denser sampling of the facial soft tissue depths of a more representative subset of the actual Caucasian population over the different age and body posture subcategories. This database can be used as an updated chart for manual and computer-based craniofacial approximation and allows more refined analyses of the possible factors affecting facial soft tissue depth.