Is current bite mark analysis a misnomer?

Four human-to-human bite mark cases in which forensic odontological opinion was found to be in error, or at best deeply divided between experts, are described. These are used to illustrate that there is a growing awareness on the part of the legal profession that bite mark opinions by experts may often be little more than that and that these opinions often cannot be substantiated given the paucity of rigorous scientific evaluation, and will therefore be increasingly challenged. This may not best serve justice and so it is argued that forensic odontology needs to bring more scientific rigour to the evaluation of bite marks. This may threaten to disenfranchise some of the current practitioners and there may be some resistance to change. Forensic odontology is not the only identification science facing such problems, but nevertheless a paradigm shift is predicted in the way bite mark evidence will have to be gathered and evaluated in the future. Some new scientific approaches are described that strive to unravel some of the most basic problems confronting our profession when we attempt to make morphometric comparisons between injuries and the dentition of the biter. A need to capture the actions and consequences of biting in 3D dimensions and simultaneously in real-time is proposed as a path of investigation highly likely to bring some clarity to a confused situation. There is also an urgent need for the ongoing controversy between some of our eminent peers relating to the assumed uniqueness, or otherwise, of the human anterior dentition to be resolved.

3-D imaging and quantitative comparison of human dentitions and simulated bite marks.

This study presents a technique developed for 3-D imaging and quantitative comparison of human dentitions and simulated bite marks. A sample of 42 study models and the corresponding bites, made by the same subjects in acrylic dental wax, were digitised by laser scanning. This technique allows image comparison of a 3-D dentition with a 3-D bite mark, eliminating distortion due to perspective as experienced in conventional photography. Cartesian co-ordinates of a series of landmarks were used to describe the dentitions and bite marks, and a matrix was created to compare all possible combinations of matches and non-matches using cross-validation techniques. An algorithm, which estimated the probability of a dentition matching its corresponding bite mark, was developed. A receiver operating characteristic graph illustrated the relationship between values for specificity and sensitivity. This graph also showed for this sample that 15% of non-matches could not be distinguished from the true match, translating to a 15% probability of falsely convicting an innocent person.

A systems-based disease management model: achieving optimal health care outcomes.

In this article, the "disease management system model" is presented, which is applicable to health care providers practicing in community, hospital, and long-term care settings. The core service of patient information for diabetic care is used to demonstrate how the model integrates individual system components involved in health care delivery.

Quantitative analysis of the amount of larval serum protein-1 (LSP-1) synthesized by flies with different doses of the LSP-1 coding sequences.

Larval serum protein-1 (LSP-1) and LSP-2 are the major proteins of Drosophila larval serum. The amount of LSP-1 synthesized is strictly proportional to the number of LSP-1 genes present within the range 1-10. The normal number in female flies is 6. Flies with extreme amounts of LSP-1 were, by our criteria, as fit as the wild type. The ratio of LSP-2:LSP-1 was analyzed in 169 different stocks and was constant in 164 of these. The significantly different ratios in five stocks were all due to the lack of one of the LSP-1 gene products.