Photographs of the human face and broken projective symmetry

The exact projective symmetry manifested in photographs is broken if the object is not flat. It has been found that front view perspectives of the human face, photographed with limited variations in camera angle (within 30 degrees) show a breaking projective symmetry sufficiently small to be considered for accurate comparison. As a practical implementation of this new approach, a computer-controlled video camera superimposition technique has been developed and demonstrated in the identification of a disguised human face.     

Is There a Correlation Between Footstep Length,Lower Extremities,and Stature?, ,

A probable correlation between stature and footstep length is expected, and consequently, the stature may be estimated from footstep length. The present research was conducted to study the correlation of footstep length with length of the lower extremities and stature. The study participants (n = 142) were asked to walk on a paper sheet with inked feet and footstep length was measured. Mean stature and lower limb length were significantly larger in males. Sex differences were not observed in the average footstep length. Average footstep length and lower limb length did not show a significant correlation among the participants. A statistically significant correlation was observed between average footstep length and stature only among females. Our observations suggest that the length of the lower limb may not be a major factor in determining the footstep length of a person and that the forensic utility of stature estimation from footstep length may be limited.     

Chinese agriculture: A quantitative look

Chinese agriculture has undoubtedly achieved a significant increase in gross agricultural output since the beginning of the new regime. However, for lack of sufficient information, it is difficult to make quantitative estimates of such an increase. Knowledge of the Chinese agriculture even before the Communist take‐over is far from complete. This is a further handicap in an assessment of the contribution of recent developmental efforts. There is some qualitative evidence in historical writings^l which suggests that the level of pre‐modem agricultural technology and practice in China was already very high² long before the present century but the quantitative information available from such historical studies is fragmentary, and often inconclusive. Even when reasonably reliable information seems to be available, its representativeness is open to question. The only reasonably representative account of the Chinese agriculture is available for the early 1930s in Buck's Land Utilization in China. Except for the first decade of the Communist rule in China, the quality of statistics deteriorated markedly. Any attempt, however painstaking, to estimate the rate of growth of the agricultural sector or of agriculture's contribution to the gross national product is bound to be nothing more than broad approximations. The aim of this paper, therefore, is not to add one more ‘guess estimate’ to many such estimates of dubious validity that are already floating around. The aim is mainly to point out the limitation of the data on which such estimates are based. It is not an attempt at denigrating the painstaking efforts of careful Sinologists to piece together fragmentary information from both academic and non‐academic (largely intelligence and diplomatic) sources, but to warn the users that an unqualified acceptance of their results³ (e.g. such as the rates of growth, etc.) in comparative studies may not have sufficient justification.     

Population data for four population groups from the United States for the eleven Y-chromosome STR loci recommended by SWGDAM

POPULATIONS: Caucasian ( n =1243), African American ( n =1605), Hispanic ( n =454), and Native American ( n =104).     

An economised craniofacial identification system

It has been attempted to develop an economised craniofacial identification system, as a special automated version of photo/video superimposition technique, that can deal with common cases of personal identification with the aid of a skull and a nearly front view face photograph of the suspected victim.The proposed method is economic in respect of (i) cost of hardware configuration, (ii) processing time as well as (iii) manual labour involved. Over and above, it has got a capability to take care of ambiguities due to soft tissue thickness during the selection of facial features, which is a part of the procedure.In order to reconstruct a 2-D cranial image, superimposable over the facial one, the new method does not need any reconstruction of a digitised 3-D cranial image. It works simply by a suitable segment-wise processing of a 2-D cranial image with the aid of the symmetry perceiving adaptive neuronet (SPAN), that has recently been introduced in connection with nearly front view facial image recognition. The final comparison of the facial and the superimposable cranial images is as versatile as the same for facial image recognition by SPAN.A practical application of this extended version of SPAN has been demonstrated in the present paper.     

DNA profiling of azoospermic semen samples from vasectomized males by using Y-PLEX 6 amplification kit

Post-vasectomized azoospermic semen samples (N = 6) were analyzed for short tandem repeats (STR) on the Y-chromosome by using Y-PLEX 6 and the 310 Genetic Analyzer. We have observed a wide variation in the yield of extracted DNA from 12.5-1,000 ng. This variation was attributed to the number of epithelial and/or white blood cells that are present in these azoospermic samples. DNA profiles of these vasectomized males were obtained for all six Y-STR loci, namely DYS393, DYS 19, DYS389II, DYS390, DYS391, and DYS385 amplified by using the Y-PLEX 6.