Three-Dimensional Morphometric Analysis of Human Cranial Sutures: Insights into Age-Related Variations
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.69980/ajpr.v28i5.630Keywords:
cranial sutures; morphometric analysis; psychiatric rehabilitation; cognitive aging; neurodevelopmentAbstract
The age-related modifications of the cranial suture morphology are of equal importance to clinical psychiatry and rehabilitation as they are of forensic interest. The pattern of suture closure has been shown to alter cranial development and is also suspected to play a role in craniofacial dysmorphias and possible cognitive deficiency. Advanced morphometric definition of such transformations promises to provide valuable information to support the rehabilitation of psychiatry, because the correlation of the structure of the head with functional aspects of ageing and neurocognitive status is important. The analysis utilised the three-dimensional surface scanning and geometric morphometric methods to examine the cranial suture geometry at a large age interval. Geometric morphometrics using the landmarks, Procrustes superimposition and principal component analysis (PCA), were used to measure suture morphology. Multiple regressions were used to investigate the inter-relationship between chronological age, suture patterns and neurodevelopmental integrity implications. The results indicated a close age-related variation with intertwined sutures of complex morphology in younger specimens, which become simplified and partially obliterated in older skulls. CA explained 81% of the morphological differences and distinguished between younger and older ones. Analysis of regression indicated a strong correlation between suture simplification and age, which may have implications on the study of craniofacial contributions to cognitive aeing, thus offering a new avenue of inquiry in relation to psychiatric rehabilitation. The implications of these findings are the transferability of structural markers to the integrative interdisciplinary development of rehabilitation interventions.
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