Modelling the dynamics of craniofacial growth

An analysis, visualization and modelling of the dynamics of craniofacial growth is presented, which is based on a Karhunen–Loève decomposition of time-discrete landmark data describing the craniofacial skeleton and its growth. This allows for a clear and suggestive depiction of craniofacial growth patterns and their dynamical behaviour, which is necessary for medical diagnosis as well as for orthodontic treatment. For modelling the dynamics, a medically motivated approach based on a dynamical system with general and individual parameters is used to obtain the underlying general growth laws. The parameters are identified by a least squares method for fitting the model to the growth data which consist of a rat calvarial data set and data of a human growth study. This allows for a quantitative description of the dynamics of size and shape changes as well as a qualitative prediction of growth processes.