Question:

How do Teeth identify a body?

by  |  earlier

0 LIKES UnLike

I was watching the news and they had found a few skeletal remains and they were going to identify them by their teeth.

Now I realize that in this day and age dental records are available but in the case where centuries old skeletons are found how do the teeth identify the body?

If they cant tell by bones, how can teeth tell anymore info?

 Tags:

   Report

3 ANSWERS


  1. If there are no dental records to use, they may drill into a molar to try and get dna.  They might be able to then compare that to people who may be related to the body to determine who it might be.


  2. They can usually tell how old the body is, but I'm not sure how, from just the teeth, they would know EXACTLY who that person was.

  3. Only through dental records can one ID a body which has either been burned or decomposed beyond recognition. However if someone has never had dental work or at least had dental work done in this country with traceable records then attempting to identify someone through dental records alone are useless. As for archaeological purposes looking at the teeth of a centuries old skeleton tells alot about ones diet, age and general health.

Question Stats

Latest activity: earlier.
This question has 3 answers.

BECOME A GUIDE

Share your knowledge and help people by answering questions.