长期以来,呈现热引起的变化的骨骼人类遗骸一直是研究的重点。然而,人类学家要充分解释和理解这些变化还有很长的路要走。热引起的颜色修饰是骨骼中最不了解的现象之一,显示各种例外(例如,黄色的色彩,橙色,蓝色,绿色,粉色,和红色)到骨骼暴露于高温时可以产生的预期颜色变化(即,象牙,棕色,黑色,各种深浅的灰色,和白色)。除了这些,关于确定观察到的确切颜色和使用的命名法的方法,文献中缺乏均匀化,让位于主观描述。然而,在最近的研究中可以看到对更客观和可靠方法的承诺。在这次审查中,我们汇编了多年来在文献中发表的数据,以描述有关热引起的颜色变化的可能性,以推断死亡情况以及这些方法在法律框架中的适用性。
Skeletal human remains presenting heat-induced changes have been a focus of study for a long time. However, there is still a long way to go for the anthropologists to be able to fully interpret and understand these changes. Heat-induced colour modifications are one of the least understood phenomena in bone, displaying a variety of exceptions (e.g., tints of yellow, orange, blue, green, pink, and red) to the expected colour variations that bone can produce when exposed to high temperatures (i.e., ivory, brown, black, various shades of grey, and white). In addition to these, there is a lack of uniformization in the literature regarding the methods to determine the exact colourations observed and the nomenclature used, giving way to subjective descriptions. However, commitment to more objective and reliable methods is visible in more recent research. In this
review, we compiled data published in the literature throughout the years to portray the state of the art regarding the potential of heat-induced colour changes for inferring the circumstances of death and the applicability of these methods in the legal framework.