The colour of the human skull

The colour of the human skull was determined from 124 fresh skull samples using the tristimulus colour measurement system "Micro Color" and listed as The Commission Internationale de l'Eclairage (CIE) L*a*b*-values. The skulls were found to be relatively light (L*=72.5), nearly colourless on the a*-axis (a*=-7.4), and slightly yellow (b*=16.4). No difference was found between the colours of the outer and the inner surfaces of the skulls. Including a small number (n=8) of skulls from diabetic patients in the study, we detected no colour difference between the samples from diabetics and non-diabetics. However, a hitherto unknown correlation between the subjects' age and the yellowness (b*-value) of the skull could be demonstrated.