A study of sexual dimorphism in the femur among North Indians

Determination of sex of unknown skeleton remains is the most important step in the identification process. Racial and regional differences in the populations create and maintain specificity in their dimorphic characteristics. Moreover, considering continued secular changes in the population structure, constant revision of osteometric standards becomes mandatory. In an effort to establish osteometric standards for the femur of contemporary North Indian populations, 122 adult femora of known sex (M: 94; F: 28) were collected in the Department of Forensic Medicine, IMS, BHU, Varanasi. Eight standard parameters were measured and analyzed by discriminant function analysis using SPSS 16. The accuracy of sex prediction ranged from 70.5% to 83.6% with single variables. In stepwise analysis, epicondylar breadth, proximal breadth, and antero-posterior diameter of the lateral condyle were found to be the most discriminating variables providing an accuracy of 90.2%. The results clearly indicate the importance of the ends of femur in the determination of sex.     

THE GENESIS OF CARTEL INVESTIGATIONS: SOME INSIGHTS FROM EXAMINING THE DYNAMIC INTERRELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN U.S. CIVIL AND CRIMINAL ANTITRUST INVESTIGATIONS

The U.S. Department of Justice has prosecuted over 1600 criminalantitrust (price-fixing and related) cases since 1970. Yet weknow precious little about the true genesis of these investigations.This paper uses the vector-autoregression methodology to examinethe dynamic interrelationships between the various criminaland civil antitrust enforcement variables. A key result is thatthe number of criminal prosecutions increases in the years immediatelyfollowing an increase in the number of civil cases, suggestingthat merger reviews and other civil investigations may alertthe antitrust authorities to criminal antitrust activities.To the best of my knowledge, this is the first econometric analysisthat demonstrates the quantitative size of this effect and thetime lags in the relationship. Other findings include importantdynamic interrelationships between grand jury investigations,the number of individuals and corporations prosecuted, and criminalcases, indicating that information unearthed during a givencriminal investigation and prosecution often reveals informationabout other conspiracies leading to future investigations andprosecutions. Finally, the number of criminal cases prosecutedincreases following an economic downturn. We relate this increaseto the literature, which points to cartel instability duringeconomic downturns.     

A Three‐Locus,PCR‐based Method for Forensic Identification of Plant Material

Plant residue is currently an underutilized resource in forensic investigations despite the fact that many crime scenes, as well as suspects and victims, harbor plant‐derived residue that could be recovered and analyzed. Notwithstanding the considerable skill of forensic botanists, current methods of species determination could benefit from tools for DNA‐based species identification. However, DNA barcoding in plants has been hampered by sequence complications in the plant genome. Following a database search for usable barcodes, broad‐spectrum primers were designed and utilized to amplify and sequence the rbcL, trnL‐F, and rrn18 genetic loci from a variety of household plants. Once obtained, these DNA sequences were used to design species‐targeted primers that could successfully discriminate the source of plant residue from among the 21 species tested.