Forensic anthropology is a multidisciplinary field that deals with the legal description of human remains, ranging from osteology to human physiology (Cattaneo, 2007; Krishan et al., 2016). In human-made and natural disasters where dead bodies decompose and/or disintegrate beyond recognition, identification of the remains is of great importance for the advancement of legal processes (de Boer et al., 2018). Bone tissue and its characteristics, which are the framework of vertebrate bodies and provide information about the mechanisms of adaptation to the environment, help estimate the identity of the individual by providing information not only about the origin of the individual from which it was obtained but also about population affinity, sex, age, and height (Belcher et al., 2022). In recent years, not only the age and sex estimation of dead bodies but also age and sex estimation in subjects such as adoption, child abuse and neglect, child labor issues, criminal cases, pornography, and immigration, especially in living children, have gained importance (Ubelaker & Longeway, 2019).

Sex estimation is the most important and first step to obtaining a reliable biological profile (Farias Gomes et al., 2019). Accurate sex estimation is critical in estimating age, population affinity, and height, as there may be differences in growth and development and population affinity between the sexes (Apaydin & Ozbey, 2020). Since changes in skeletal morphology between the sexes in the prepubertal period are insignificant, accurate estimation of the sex of an adult individual is easier and more reliable than that of a newborn or prepubertal individual. While phalanges, long bones, patella, pelvis, sternum, and cranium are used in the estimation of adult sex in different populations and population affinities around the world, studies on sex prediction in the prepubertal stage have often focused on the pelvis and cranium (Gualdi-Russo, 2007; Raghavendra Babu et al., 2012; Chandrakanth et al., 2014; Trautmann & Trautmann, 2014; Kranioti & Apostol, 2015; Hayashizaki et al., 2015; Krishan et al., 2016; Bonczarowska et al., 2021). This is due to the fact that the reliability and accuracy of sex estimation are directly dependent on the anatomy of skeletal remains and existing bones (Krishan et al., 2016). After the onset of puberty, the differences between male and female craniums become clearer as the male cranium develops some adult features, but the female cranium tends to retain pedomorphic features (Wood, 2015).

Although the human pelvis is the most dimorphic bone that can be used for sex estimation, it cannot be preserved, especially post-mortem, due to its fragility. For this reason, the human mandible, the second most dimorphic bone of the body, is often preferred for sex estimation (Bigoni et al., 2010, Gillet et al., 2020). The use of the human mandible, which is considered to be the most resistant bone of the face, in estimating sex occurs through qualitative and quantitative analyses. Qualitatively, the human male mandible has more robust anatomical features and a lower degree of thinness while being rougher due to greater chewing forces (Carvalho et al., 2013, Mello-Gentil and Souza-Mello, 2021). On the other hand, females produce weaker muscle forces during chewing, resulting in smoother surfaces of muscle attachments and smaller lower jaws (Velemínská et al., 2012). As documented by anthropologists, the human male mandible is generally significantly larger than the human female mandible. This finding, which is also used for medicolegal purposes, has been shown in many studies (Carvalho et al., 2013, Sharma et al., 2016, Sikka and Jain, 2016).

When the organism is examined in general, after puberty, as males exhibit a wider ontogenetic trajectory than females (rate and time hypermorphosis), the difference between the sexes increases, and male and female trajectories also differ in shape space (Bulygina et al., 2006, Coquerelle et al., 2011). For the human mandible, similar size change rates were observed in males and females before and after the pubertal period until the mean age of 9–12 years. While size increase gradually slows down in females during the pubertal period, this slowdown is not observed in males until around the age of 17 (Fan et al., 2019). From puberty to adulthood, males are characterized by a continuation of allometric shape changes, whereas the shape of the human female mandible continues to change even after size has ceased to increase. The female ontogenetic trajectory thus departs from the allometric direction after puberty (Coquerelle et al., 2011).

Anatomical formations on the human mandible may also show dimensional and positional changes depending on the effect of anatomical differences and adaptation, both in different sexes and depending on pubertal status (Alarcón et al., 2016, Nuzzolese et al., 2019). Condylar and coronoid processes, mental and mandibular foramen, lingula mandibulae, lower, upper, anterior, and posterior borders and corners of the human mandible, and alveolar processes vary spatially and dimensionally in different sexes and depending on pubertal status and age (Koudelová et al., 2015, Patcas et al., 2017). Quantitative analyses are based on the principle of metric evaluation of anatomical formations in different parts of the human mandible. The most important point of these analyses is that the results differ for individuals of different population affinities and sexes living in different geographical regions. For this reason, studies suggest that similar measurements are made in different population affinities and regions to obtain results for relevant populations (Carvalho et al., 2013, Vinay et al., 2013).

Although the change in the localization of the lingula mandibulae has been the subject of studies on mandibular block anesthesia due to the entry point of the mandibular nerve into the human mandible (Ahn et al., 2020, Choi and Hur, 2021), no studies have been found on the localization of the lingula mandibulae in relation to puberty in the forensic and anthropological context.

Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the changes in the localization of the lingula mandibulae on panoramic radiographs of a group of children before and after puberty and to investigate the differences in these changes between the sexes. The first hypothesis of the study was that there was no significant change in the localization of the lingula mandibulae before and after puberty in the same sex. The second hypothesis of the study was that there was no change in the localization of the lingula mandibulae before and after puberty in males and females.