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Updated: Jul 15, 2026

Systematic Assessment of Mammalian Skull Specimens for Dental and Temporomandibular Joint Pathology
Published on: August 22, 2022
Comparative study on the effect of ethnicity on wisdom tooth eruption
A Olze1, P van Niekerk, T Ishikawa
1Institut für Rechtsmedizin, Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Turmstrasse 21, 10553 Berlin, Germany. OlzeAnDr@aol.com
Abstract:
The current knowledge base for evaluating the influence of ethnic origin on wisdom tooth eruption is still inadequate. We therefore analyzed and compared the chronology of wisdom tooth eruption in three ethnic populations-German, Japanese, and black South African-based on evidence from 2,482 conventional orthopantomograms. The investigated German population ranked in the middle in terms of the age of wisdom tooth eruption. The black South African population was the fastest and the Japanese population the slowest in terms of reaching the respective eruption stages. Population-specific reference data should be used when evaluating wisdom tooth eruption for the purpose of forensic age estimation.
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