Anthropology Case Studies

Case studies Many cases in the literature have utilized CT imaging to address bioarchaeological questions; however, predominately they focus on mummification studies, with only a few cases in reference to bone specifically. One such case was in the article Non-invasive Archaeology of Skeletal Material by CT scanning and Three-dimensional Reconstruction by Lynnerup et al. (1997). In this case the skeletal remains are of a very fragile and delicate 7000 year old ancient Sumerian skeleton that was recovered in a block, preserving its soil matrix. A CT scan was performed on the skeletal material and soil matrix. The resulting image was process with software that allowed for differentiation between bone and soil by use of a grey-scale thresholding method; however, manual editing had to be done of the each single CT scans slices due to the presence of artifacts. The resulting clean images were rendering into a 3D image (Lynnerup et al., 1997). The scans revealed fragmentation of the cranial vault and facial skeleton, with the mandible approximately intact. A stereolithographic model (form of 3D printing) was produced which showed “post-mortem diagenetic changes of the mandible, such as extremely brittle cortical bone tissue, especially at the rami, and fracture lines” (92). This technique is being recommended for any remains that have been partly damaged or fragmented, which would be of particular …show more content…
(2004), presents an interesting case study that tests the hypothesis of whether you can visualize cribra orbitalia using CT imaging. They were able to visualize the sieve-like lesion at varying threshold levels using MSCT in the spiral and sequential mode and produce a virtual endoscopic and 3D images in post processing (Exner et al., 2004). Advances in imaging techniques has allowed identification of living subject with these lesions, allowing for the study of the etiology for the first