mandibular dimensional changes with aging in three dimensional computed tomographic study in 21 to 50 year old men and women

introduction: raising the knowledge of skeletal and soft tissue changes with aging has been highly essential due to an increasing demand for aesthetic facial surgery following aging. the aim of this study is to evaluate the three dimensional computed tomographic images and process of changes in mandible with aging. materials and methods: in this descriptive study, the facial ct scans were obtained from 124 subjects (70 men and 54 women). the population of the study was categorized in three ages (21 to 30, 31 to 40, 41 to 50). each ct image was reinforced under volume rendering three-dimensional reconstruction by using the three dimensional analysis software volume viewer. the specific parts of mandible consisting of bigonial width, mandibular body height, ramus breadth, ramus height, mandibular body length and mandibular angle were measured and the data were analyzed employing two-ways analysis of variance. results: in both genders, there was no significant changes in bigonial width with aging (p=0.88). mandibular body height for both genders decreased with aging but the result was not statistically significant (p=0.19). ramus breadth decreased with aging in both genders (p=0.02).considering the obtained means, ramus height and mandibular body length did not show significant changes in different age categories (p=0.09) (p=0.54). in both genders mandibular angle increased with aging (p=0.17). conclusion: mandibular angle in women is greater than men and also for ramus breadth. there is no significant difference between men and women.