Biological anthropology

About: Biological anthropology is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 1126 publications have been published within this topic receiving 12757 citations. The topic is also known as: biological anthropology & somatology.

Application of Physical Anthropology to Human Nutritional Assessment

Abstract: by ROBERT A. HALBERSTEIN Departments of Anthropology and of Epidemiology and Public Health, University of Miami, Coral Gables, Fla. 33124, U.S.A. 18 x 78 Research activities in physical anthropology, medicine, and nutrition have traditionally overlapped in scope and methodology. The past few years have witnessed a closer interaction and collaboration of these three related fields, which share interests in various aspects of human biology and health. Medical and nutritional studies, for example, have increasingly drawn upon anthropological data (e.g., Grollig and Haley 1976, Halberstein 1975, Krogman 1976, El-Najjar and McWilliams 1978, Fitzgerald 1977). A number of recent investigations have also emphasized the critical importance of a thorough nutritional evaluation of persons with diagnosed medical problems, especially hospital patients (e.g., Christakis 1973, Medical World News 1978). A workshop entitled \"The Application of Physical Anthropology to Human Nutritional Assessment\" was conducted in the summer of 1978 at Baptist Hospital in Miami, Florida, as part of that institution's In-Service Education and Skill Enhancement Program. The goal of the project was to augment and improve routine nutritional assessment procedures, particularly in the hospital setting, in order ultimately to assist in the successful treatment of patients. Methods and published findings in physical anthropology were utilized, focusing primarily upon anthropometry and worldwide data on human variation in metrical traits. The 35 nurses and hospital nutritionists participating in the workshop were first exposed to lectures and audiovisual presentations concerning cross-cultural research on the multiple factors affecting human morphology and nutritional status. Genetic and environmental influences on individual and populational variations in body form and composition were explored. Scientific studies were reviewed on the constitutional effects of ethnic background, sexual dimorphism, aging, geography and climate, exercise and activity patterns, disease, dietary habits, and the inheritance of certain well-defined genetic conditions (achondroplasia, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, dystonia musculorum deformans, etc.) .2 Anthropometric techniques were introduced with a historical discussion of the value and practical uses of human body measurements. Anthropometric nstruments were exhibited, and their methodological imitations were noted. In a series of workshop sessions, 50 anthropometric dimensions and 12 indices were demonstrated in a step-by-step \"cookbook\" format. The measurements, elected on the basis of their relevance to nutritional work, were drawn from standard references (e.g., Brozek 1956, Garn 1962, Prinsloo 1964, Montagu 1960, Weiner and Lourie 1969). Virtually all areas of the body were included -head, face, neck, trunk, limbs, etc. Stature, weight, skinfolds, and various circumferential measurements received special emphasis. Skinfold readings from ten different sites were obtained with Lange, Harpenden, and Ross calipers and compared. In subsequent sessions, workshop participants practiced measuring each other, employing the ten anthropometric dimensions

Notes for the History of Forensic Physical Anthropology in Mexico

Abstract: This work is aimed at making known forensic physical anthropology in Mexico. This work was carried out through the consultation of various written sources, which allowed us to know that such activity began with the investigations of m.d. Francisco Martinez Baca and m.d. Manuel Vergara, at the former Puebla jail in Mexico city, and m.d. Ignacio Fernandez Ortigoza, at the former Belem jail in Mexico city, at the end of the XIX century and at the beginning of the XX century, whose studies are based on the so-called “criminal anthropology”. Already in the XX century, we have the works of Vargas, Alva and Lujan, and the one of Arturo Romano Pacheco carried out at the Procuraduria General de Justicia del Distrito Federal from 1975, a date that can be considered as the end of old-fashioned criminal anthropology and the beginning of modern forensic physical anthropology. This work also presents the contributions of Mexican physical anthropologists and students of physical anthropology at the Escuela Nacional de Antropologia e Historia to forensic physical anthropology. Their works have not only helped to solve cases but have also contributed to the teaching and divulging of this subject.

Problems of comparative studies in arctic maritime cultures based on archaeological data

Abstract: Archaeological evidence for the development of the Eskimo Culture and its evolutionary stages is discussed. Although this development is more or less clear for the past two millennia, relations of the Eskimo area with other northern Pacific maritime cultures are far less certain. Differing views concerning the extent to which these various cultures had a common source or were the result of convergent and independent development are presented and discussed. Ecological interpretations of some technological changes shed light on the data as does the evidence of physical anthropology.