The aim of this chapter is to explain what legal medicine is (from its background to the present), and forensic pathology in particular—what its objectives are, what forensic doctors do, and when, why, how, and for whom. Furthermore, the author aims to identify their main difficulties and expectancies. Starting from the definition and going through a brief historical contextualization, this cha...

The rhomboid fossa of clavicle was studied globally by forensic experts and anthropologists to determine the age and sex. This study was done on samples of human clavicles from North Karnataka of South India to determine the sexual dimorphism which is of anthropological, forensic and clinical importance. In this study mid shaft circumference, morphology of rhomboid fossa of clavicle was analyse...

There is increasing evidence that many of the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) databases published in the fields of forensic science and molecular anthropology are flawed. An a posteriori phylogenetic analysis of the sequences could help to eliminate most of the errors and thus greatly improve data quality. However, previously published caveats and recommendations along these lines were not yet picked...

One of the most important tasks in forensic anthropology is human identification. Over the past decades, forensic anthropologists have focused on improving techniques to increase the accuracy of identification. Following a thorough examination of unidentified human remains, the investigator chooses a specific identification technique to be applied, depending on the availability of ante mortem a...

AIM To describe the contribution of forensic anthropology to the recovery, analysis, and identification of victims from the 1991-1995 war in Croatia recovered in wells. METHODS From 1996 to the present, human remains of a total of 61 individuals have been recovered from 13 wells. Six wells contained the remains of a single individual, one well contained the remains of 2 individuals, and 6 wel...

DNA was extracted from human and animal bones recovered from archaeological sites and mitochondrial DNA sequences were amplified from the extracts using the polymerase chain reaction. Evidence is presented that the amplified sequences are authentic and do not represent contamination by extraneous DNA. The results show that significant amounts of genetic information can survive for long periods ...