The variability of palm print ridge density among Egyptians regarding distribution and sex discrimination

Cover Page

Cite item

Full Text

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Sex determination, as a part of the biological profile of a victim or assailant, plays an important role in resolving different forensic cases as it reduces susceptibility to its half (fifty percent). Previous studies highlighted the role of palm print in sex identification, however, these studies were little when compared to fingerprints.

AIM: To estimate the density of palm print ridges and to make an equation for establishing gender using gender parameters for a specific population (Egyptians).

MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study was conducted on 200 healthy young adults (113 males and 87 males, aged 18–22 years) from Cairo city, Egypt. The palm prints were taken by inking method and four areas of the palm print were analyzed to count the ridge density of each palm print area.

RESULTS: Females describe higher ridge density than males in all palm areas with a significant high statistical difference (p <0.001) for all areas of both hands. The areas of highest sexual discriminatory power for the right palm was Palmar area 4 (P4) and for the left palm was Palmar area 1 (P1) and sex could be accurately identified at an accuracy of 70%. In addition, there was a significant correlation for ridge density in each palm area and other palm areas.

CONCLUSION: The current study raises hope for the usage of palm print a newly added tool for sex identification in the forensic field, thus decreasing suspicion by fifty percent.

About the authors

Nazih Ramadan

Department of Forensic Medicine and Clinical Toxicology, Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University

Author for correspondence.
Email: drnazihramadan@kasralainy.edu.eg
ORCID iD: 0000-0002-4090-5416

MD

Egypt, Cairo

Asmaa Mohamed Sayed Ahmed

Department of Forensic Medicine and Clinical Toxicology, Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University

Email: Asmaa.m.abdallah@kasralainy.edu.eg
ORCID iD: 0000-0002-7794-5243

Msc

Egypt, Cairo

References

  1. Ali FI, Ahmed AA. Sexual and topological variability in palmprint ridge density in a sample of Sudanese population. Forensic Anthropology. 2020;2:100151. doi: 10.1016/j.fsir.2020.100151
  2. Karmakar B, Yakovenko K, Kobyliansky E. Qualitative finger and palmar dermatoglyphics: sexual dimorphism in the Chuvashian population of Russia. Anthropol Anz. 2007;65(4):383–390.
  3. Usman A, El-Ladan IS. Distribution and sexual dimorphism of palm print variable (Palm creases) among Hausa of Kano and Zaria, Nigeria. Bayero J Pure Appl Sci. 2020;12(1):133–138. doi: 10.4314/bajopas.v12i1.22S
  4. Ramadan N, Abd El Salam MH, Hanon AF, et al. Age and sex identification using multi-slice computed tomography of the last thoracic vertebrae of an egyptian sample. J Forensic Res. 2017;8(5):386. doi: 10.4172/2157-7145.1000386
  5. Kaushal N, Kaushal P. Human identification and fingerprints: a review. J Biom Biostat. 2011;2(4):2–5. doi: 10.4172/2155-6180.1000123
  6. Adamu LH, Taura MG. Embryogenesis and applications of fingerprints: a review. Int J Hum Anat. 2017;1(1):1–8. doi: 10.14302/issn.2577-2279.ijha-17-1539
  7. Adetona M, Shokunbil M. The variation of ridge density in palm prints among nigerian ethnic populations and its forensic use for sex determination. Arch Bas App Med. 2018;6(2):173–176.
  8. Rivaldería N, Gutiérrez-Redomero E. Distribution of the minutiae in palmprints: Topological and sexual variability. J Forensic Sci. 2021;66(1):135–148. doi: 10.1111/1556-4029.14583
  9. Nanakorn S, Kutanan W. Variability of finger ridge density among thai adolescents. J Forensic Res. 2012;4:1–4. doi: 10.4172/2157-7145.S1-005
  10. Wang J, Lin C, Chang Y, et al. Gender determination using fingertip features. Internet J Med Updat. 2008;3(2):22–28. doi: 10.4314/ijmu.v3i2.39838
  11. Acree M. Is there a gender difference in fingerprint ridge density? Forensic Sci Int. 1999;102(1):35–44. doi: 10.1016/s0379-0738(99)00037-7
  12. Ahmed AA, Osman S. Topological variability and sex differences in fingerprint ridge density in a sample of the Sudanese population. J Forensic Leg Med. 2016;42:25–32. doi: 10.1016/j.jflm.2016.05.005
  13. Gutiérrez-Redomero E, Alonso C, Romero E, Galera V. Variability of fingerprint ridge density in a sample of Spanish Caucasians and its application to sex determination. Forensic Sci Int. 2008;180(1):17–22. doi: 10.1016/j.forsciint.2008.06.014
  14. Kanchan T, Krishan K, Aparna KR, Shyamsundar S. Is there a sex difference in palm print ridge density? Med Sci Law. 2013;53(1):33–39. doi: 10.1258/msl.2012.011092
  15. Krishan K, Ghosh A, Kanchan T, et al. Sex differences in fingerprint ridge density--causes and further observations. J Forensic Leg Med. 2010;17(3):172–173. doi: 10.1016/j.jflm.2009.12.003
  16. Gutiérrez-Redomero E, Alonso-Rodríguez C. Sexual and topological differences in palmprint and ridge density in the caucasian Spanish population. Forensic Sci Int. 2013;229(1-3):159e1-10. doi: 10.1016/j.forsciint.2013.03.014
  17. Moorthy NT, Rajathi S. Sexual dimorphism from palm print ridge density among Malaysian Tamils for person identification. J Krishna Inst Med Sci Univ. 2020;9(1):e1–e7.
  18. Krishan K, Kanchan T, Sharma R, Pathania A. Variability of palmprint ridge density in a North Indian population and its use in inference of sex in forensic examinations. Homo. 2014;65(6):476–488. doi: 10.1016/j.jchb.2014.08.003
  19. Jerković I, Ljubić T, Bardić L, et al. Application of palmar digital intertriradial distances for sex classification from palmprints: a preliminary study. Aust J Forensic Sci. 2021;1–12. doi: 10.1080/00450618.2021.1882573
  20. Komjaroenpompong R, Saisophon C, Benchawattananon R. Sexual differences in palmprints in a population of Buengkan province, Thailand: Sexual differences in palmprints. In: 2015 International Conference on Science and Technology, 04-06 November 2015. Р. 61–63. doi: 10.1109/TICST.2015.7369341
  21. Jain AK, Feng J. Latent palmprint matching. IEEE Trans Pattern Anal Mach Intell. 2009;31(6):1032–1047. doi: 10.1109/TPAMI.2008.242
  22. Chauhan A. Determination of sex from the latent palm prints present on documents. J Forensic Res. 2015;6(5):149–153. doi: 10.4172/2157-7145.1000300
  23. Ohler E, Cummins H. Sexual differences in breadths of epidermal ridges on finger tips and palms. Am J Phys Anthr. 1942;29(3):341–362. doi: 10.1002/ajpa.1330290302
  24. Hosmer DW, Lemeshow S. Applied Logistic Regression. 2nd ed. John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ, USA; 2000. 376 p. doi: 10.1002/0471722146
  25. Abd-elaleem S, Mohammed A, Hassan E. Determination of sex and stature from latent palm prints present on documents in egyptian population sample. Int J Forensic Sci Pathol. 2017;5(4):360–369. doi: 10.19070/2332-287X-1700079
  26. Badiye A, Kapoor N, Mishra SD. A novel approach for sex determination using palmar tri-radii: a pilot study. J Forensic Leg Med. 2019;65:22–26. doi: 10.1016/j.jflm.2019.04.005
  27. Jantz RL. Sex and race differences in finger ridge-count correlations. Am J Phys Anthropol. 1977;46(1):171–176. doi: 10.1002/ajpa.1330460122
  28. Králík M, Novotny VV. Epidermal ridge breadth: an indicator of age and sex in paleodermatoglyphics. Variability and Evolution. 2003;11:5–30.
  29. Karmakar B, Yakovenko K, Kobyliansky E. Quantitative digital and palmar dermatoglyphics: sexual dimorphism in the Chuvashian population of Russia. Homo. 2008;59(4):317–328. doi: 10.1016/j.jchb.2007.01.002
  30. Kanchan T, Rastogi P. Sex determination from hand dimensions of North and South Indians. J Forensic Sci. 2009;54(3):546–550. doi: 10.1111/j.1556-4029.2009.01018.x

Supplementary files

Supplementary Files
Action
1. JATS XML
Download
2. Fig. 1. Designated areas on the palmprint that were analysed for the palmprint ridge density.

Download (161KB)
Indexing metadata
3. Fig. 2. ROC curve for average palm print ridge density of each hand, Rt — right hand, Lt — left hand. AUC — area under the curve, p <0.01 — significant differences.

Download (156KB)
Indexing metadata

Copyright (c) 2022 Eco-Vector

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

This website uses cookies

You consent to our cookies if you continue to use our website.

About Cookies