Automatic estimation of age at death from human bone cross-sections using neural networks

Abstract

This paper describes on going research on digitally automating the estimation of age at death of human corpses, using micro-radiograph images of mid-shaft bone cross-sections, Traditional methods used in previous studies have involved manually calculating various statistical measures from a bone cross section. These methods were both time consuming and inaccurate, consequently the databases obtained were usually very small and hence statistical conclusions of a qualitative or quantitative nature were difficult to establish. The proposed automated system is able to process a complete bone cross-section. Various bone micro-structures are segmented using traditional image processing techniques...