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Editorial

ORIGINAL ARTICLE: PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Entheseal changes of the Achilles tendon in the Samnitic population of Opi, Val Fondillo (VII-VI century BCE; Abruzzo, central Italy): a preliminary study.
Jacopo Cilli, Arianna Di Felice, Luigi Capasso, Ruggero D’Anastasio
•    Entheseal changes provide an understanding of aging of the musculoskeletal system of ancient population.
•    Female show enthesopathies due to normal age-related development.
•    Male’s enthesopathies are much more influenced by external factors.  

ORIGINAL ARTICLE: PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY
Preliminary study of the point cloud obtained with a low cost structured light scanner of third lower human molars
Matteo Orsi, Nicol Rossetti, Roberto Taglioretti, Silvia Zito, Alessandra Mazzucchi
•    To initiate a technical protocol by testing the limits of the EinScan-SP V1 scanner using human teeth to evaluate the scanner's performance.
•    To introduce the IUD (an environment where only points exist) to illustrate the difference between digital and physical worlds.
•    To present the software osteo_labdig, aimed to perform point cloud processing for osteological data trough the libraries Open3D and Numpy.
•    To present a new digital index based on OBB and called NOOBB (Normalized Osteological Oriented Bounding Box).

CASE REPORT: PALEOPATHOLOGY
Virtual autopsy investigation of gallstones in an 18th century Sicilian mummy
Luca Ventura, Valentina Pensiero, Guido Romeo, Alessandro Causarano, Claudio Caruso, Maria Grazia Palmerini, Mirko Traversari
•    Gallstones have been infrequently described in human remains
•    Virtual autopsy through CT scanning 3D reconstruction is the golden standard to identify gallstones
•    Chemical composition of gallstones may be determined by Hounsfield scale measurements 
•    The vast majority of ancient gallstones are cholesterol-based, related to high social classes

SHORT COMMUNICATION: BIOARCHAEOLOGY
Bioarchaeology of affluence: Gold plate dentures as conspicuous consumption in the 19th century US South
Shawn M. Phillips, PhD
•    The first examples of archaeologically recovered gold plate dentures are presented.
•    Gold plate dentures reflect affluency and conspicuous consumption.
•    This study demonstrates the mouth as a nexus of identity, status, affluence and functionality.