Nonmetric traits of permanent posterior teeth in Kerala population: A forensic overview.

INTRODUCTION: Dental morphology is a highly heritable characteristic which is stable with time and has a fairly high state of preservation. Nonmetric dental traits have crucial role in ethnic classifications of a population that helps in forensic racial identification purposes.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES: To determine the frequency and variability of possible nonmetric tooth traits using extracted permanent posterior teeth from Kerala population for discerning racial ethnicity.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: This qualitative, cross-sectional study was carried out using 1743 extracted intact permanent posterior teeth collected from different dental clinics situated all over Kerala.

RESULTS: The more common features on premolars were multiple lingual cusps (31.21%), distal accessary ridges (16.28%) and Tom's root (17.9%). In upper first molars, Carabelli trait expression was 17.78% and other common features included metaconulo, cusp 5 and enamel extensions.

CONCLUSION: Posterior tooth traits had variable expression in the study population. Low prevalence rate of Carabelli trait in this study is characteristic of Asian population. This research explored new elements of invaluable tooth traits values to understand racial ethnicity of Kerala population.