The age distribution of facial metrics in two large Korean populations

Growth and alterations in craniofacial morphology have attracted interest in many fields of science, especially physical anthropology, genetics and forensic sciences. We performed an analysis of craniofacial morphology alterations by gender and ageing stage in Korean populations. We studied 15 facial metrics using two large Korean populations (1,926 samples from the Korea Medicine Data Center cohort and 5,643 samples from the Ansan-Ansung cohort). Among the 15 metrics, 12 showed gender differences and tended to change with age. In both of the independent populations, brow ridge height, upper lip height, nasal tip height, and profile nasal length tended to increase with age, whereas outer canthal width, right palpebral fissure height, left palpebral fissure height, right upper lip thickness, left upper lip thickness, nasal tip protrusion, facial base width, and lower facial width tended to decrease. In conclusion, our findings suggest that ageing (past 40 years of age) might affect eye size, nose length, upper lip thickness, and facial width, possibly due to loss of elasticity in the face. Therefore, these facial metric changes could be applied to individual age prediction and aesthetic facial care.