Chronology of the development of the deciduous dentition in Mediterranean population.

The objective of this study of the maturation of deciduous dentition was to offer a novel age-estimation method for Mediterranean populations, using the osteological collection of fetuses, infants, and young children in the Anthropology Laboratory of Granada University (Spain) as study material. After excluding premature newborns and infants with disease, the final study sample comprised 1303 deciduous teeth suitable for analysis from 138 individuals (80 male, 58 female) aged between 24 weeks in utero and 6 years. Eleven mineralization stages were defined for the dental maturation analysis, and the alveolar emergence was also studied. The criteria published by Demirjian et al. (Hum. Biol. 45 (1973) 211), Moorrees et al. (J. Dent. Res. 42 (1963a) 490), and Liversidge et al. (Am. J. Phys. Anthropol. 123 (2004) 172) were combined and modified for this purpose. The reproducibility of the proposed method is supported by the low intra- and inter-observer error in the identification of these development stages. The results provide information on the mean age of attainment of each of 11 mineralization stages and on the average age for each stage in each deciduous tooth type, considering each sex separately and both sexes combined.