A proposed morphological and metric method for three-dimensional nasal reconstruction

Forensic anthropology is the application of the knowledge and methods of physical anthropology in a medico-legal context. The unknown skeletal remains are examined to assess and assist in identifying them. When conventional methods fail, facial reconstruction is often the last recourse attempted for identifying an unknown skull. A partial nasal bridge, a small anterior nasal spine, with a large hollowed space are all that are present on a skull representing the nose. Hence, it is a challenging task for a forensic scientist to build a soft nose based on the scant available bony structure. The present study was conducted on computed tomography (CT) images of 409 individuals (226 males and 183 females). Seventeen metrical parameters, including soft tissue depths, distances and angles, were measured. Regression models were constructed to assess the various dimensions of the nose. The study also included 40 morphological attributes to identify the most frequent nasal features in the studied population. The morphological study suggests two methods. In the absence of nasal bones, it recommends using the "most frequent nasal features" method. For partially broken or intact nasal bones, the method of "characteristic association" may be adopted. The nasal framework was constructed with metrical parameters and later refined morphologically. This will increase the likelihood that a reconstructed skull resembles the antemortem face.