Determination of Sex and Hand from Individual Fingerprints

A fingerprint found at the crime scene is one of the most crucial fragments of personal identification that a person might leave behind. Apart from being every person’s unique identification mark that are ubiquitous to all, to start with, they often reveal on further examination, certain characteristics about the person that might narrow down the suspects’ pool. To identify criterions that can be conclusively analyzed to determine the side of hand and sex of a person from the fingerprint, bilateral rolled fingerprints of 200 individuals were studied. To overcome the aspect of geographical deviation, samples were collected from four major ethno-linguist populations of various regions of India namely Punjab, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Rajasthan. Prevalence of different patterns in different regions and between males and females was studied. Determination of sex from Average Ridge Count and Average Ridge Width was assessed. Both of the above parameters were found to be significantly higher in males as compared to females. In all the fingerprint patterns except plain arches, Core-Delta Euclidean Distance and the consequent slope was measured and the side of hand determined. The Right Hand Sides of both males and females have significantly lower Core Delta Euclidean Distance and higher slope angle as compared to their Left Hand Sides. All the parameters were measured through FACTS (Fingerprint Analysis and Criminal Tracing System) which is an AFIS (Automated Fingerprint Identification System). The findings of this study are helpful in concluding both the hand side and sex by analyzing an individual fingerprint.