Dental techniques for sexual diagnosis in forensic medicine: an Integrative systematic review

Abstract

Human identification by dental means is the subject of forensic odontology. In the absence of antemortem information or when human remains are highly fragmented or degraded, for Instance in case of explosive blasts or natural disasters, teeth, due to their robust nature, are an excellent study material. During criminal or mass disaster investigations, determining a person's sex becomes the priority in the process of identification by a forensic investigator, since it decreases the number of potential candidates by half. Therefore, sex estimation by dental methods is an important parameter in the identification process. The objective of this dissertation is to review the various dental methods that can be applied in sex evaluation in a forensic context. In this work, amelogenin was the most utilized gene for sex determination analysis, following DNA extraction and amplification by PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction). This methodology shows exceptionally reliable results, with 75%-100% correct identification of the samples analyzed in the studies reviewed in the present work. When using morphologic methods, the mandibular canine is the tooth most frequently analyzed (6/13 articles) and that shows the most sexual dimorphism (72,5-92.3% accuracy). For this reason, the mandibular canine index (85% accuracy in an Indian population) is a method frequently used, however, it is population dependent. Alternative methods for sex evaluation are therefore an interesting area of research and amongst these, the use of CT scans to evaluate mandibles are expected to be further developed and used in the future.