Morphological Analysis of Changes in the Thoracic Skeleton with Age and Gender

Abstract

Thoracic anthropometry variations with age and gender are expected to affect thoracic injury mechanisms and tolerance. The objective of this research was to quantify the age and gender-specific variations in the thoracic skeletal morphology for both genders and across the entire age spectrum (ages 0-100). A semi-automated image segmentation and registration algorithm was developed to collect homologous thoracic skeleton landmarks from 343 normal computed tomography (CT) scans. Rigid, affine, and symmetric diffeomorphic transformations were used to register landmarks from an atlas to homologous locations to each subject-specific coordinate system. Between 2,700 and 11,000 landmarks were collected from each rib and sternum and over 55 million total landmarks were collected from all subjects.