Aim: The exploration of heredibility of facial features: Fathers and offspring

Hypothesis: Fathers face shape has no influence on the face shape of his offspring

Twin, family and animal studies have suggested that inheritance plays a role in the determination of craniofacial morphology.1-4 Traditional two-dimensional measuring techniques on photographs or lateral skull radiographs tend to be imprecise as landmarks are subject to rotational, positional and magnification errors. However, recent advances in high resolution three-dimensional imaging technologies has provided the opportunity in detailing the spatial relationship of facial landmarks and investigating which genetic variants may be influencing these. However, the evidence for heritability of facial features is not robust and often poorly researched using small samples exhibiting weak associations between parental and offspring with mid father/mother estimates reported as a best predictor for offspring facial parameters.5,6 We will initially focus on facial parameters reported to be associated with known genes. 7,8

1. Kohn, LAP. The Role of Genetics in Craniofacial Morphology and Growth. Annual Review of Anthropology 20, 261-278(1991).

2. Saunders SR, Popovich F, Thompson GW, A family study of craniofacial dimensions in the Burlington Growth Centre sample, American Journal of Orthodontics, Volume 78, Issue 4, October 1980, Pages 394-403.

3. W. Stuart Hunter, Daniel R. Balbach, Donald E. Lamphiear, The heritability of attained growth in the human face, American Journal of Orthodontics, Volume 58, Issue 2, August 1970, Pages 128-134.

4. Johannsdottir B, Thorarinsson F, Thordarson A, Magnusson TE, Heritability of craniofacial characteristics between parents and offspring estimated from lateral cephalograms, American Journal of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopedics, Volume 127, Issue 2, February 2005, Pages 200-207.

5. Nakata M, Yu P, Davis B, Nance WE, The use of genetic data in the prediction of craniofacial dimensions, American Journal of Orthodontics, Volume 63, Issue 5, May 1973, Pages 471-480

6. Nakasima A, Ichinose M, Nakata S, Takahama Y, Hereditary factors in the craniofacial morphology of Angle's Class II and Class III malocclusions, American Journal of Orthodontics, Volume 82, Issue 2, August 1982, Pages 150-156

7. Paternoster L, Zhurov AI, Toma AM, Kemp JP, St Pourcain B, Timpson NJ, McMahon G, McArdle W, Ring SM, Smith GD, Richmond S, Evans DM. Genome-wide association study of three-dimensional facial morphology identifies a variant in PAX3 associated with nasion position. Am J Hum Genet. 2012 Mar 9;90(3):478-85.

8. Liu F, van der Lijn F, Schurmann C, Zhu G, Chakravarty MM, Hysi PG, Wollstein A, Lao O, de Bruijne M, Ikram MA, van der Lugt A, Rivadeneira F, Uitterlinden AG, Hofman A, Niessen WJ, Homuth G, de Zubicaray G, McMahon KL, Thompson PM, Daboul A, Puls R, Hegenscheid K, Bevan L, Pausova Z, Medland SE, Montgomery GW, Wright MJ, Wicking C, Boehringer S, Spector TD, Paus T, Martin NG, Biffar R, Kayser M. A genome-wide association study identifies five Loci influencing facial morphology in europeans. PLoS Genet. 2012 Sep;8(9):e1002932. doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1002932.