Sex Determination from Femoral Fragments - Discriminant Function Analysis in Contemporary South Indian Population

Diagnosis of sex from skeleton or individual bone is vital to archaeological and forensic applications. The aim of this study is to examine the applicability of the measurements taken from the femur fragments to assess sex, and to contribute to establishing discriminant function equations for medico legal applications. In a sample of 120 femora, seven variables were measured and subjected to discriminant function analysis. All the measurements are found to be individually sexually dimorphic. Univariate and multivartiate functions were computed and their accuracy were evaluated.