Geomorph (R Package)
Definition
An open-source R package (Adams and Otarola-Castillo 2013; actively maintained through 2024) implementing Procrustes superimposition, principal component analysis in shape space, multivariate regression, and visualisation for geometric morphometric analysis.
- Language
- R
- Authors
- Dean Adams and Erica Otarola-Castillo
- First released
- 2013
- Core functions
- Procrustes superimposition, shape-space PCA, regression
Common questions
What role does geomorph play in a geometric morphometric workflow?+
After landmark coordinates are digitized from 3D scans or photographs, geomorph performs the superimposition, statistical shape analysis, and visualization steps needed to compare specimens.
Is geomorph limited to forensic anthropology applications?+
No, it was developed as a general morphometrics tool and is widely used across biology and evolutionary studies, with forensic anthropology being just one of its application areas.
Why does active maintenance matter for a package used in casework?+
Continued updates fix bugs and keep compatibility with current R versions, which can affect result reproducibility, so examiners typically document the exact package version used in an analysis.
Related terms
- Agisoft Metashape
- Commercial photogrammetry software (Agisoft LLC, Saint Petersburg) widely used in forensic anthropology for 3D model production from image sets. Accuracy of approximately...
- COLMAP
- Open-source SfM photogrammetry software maintained by ETH Zurich, providing zero-cost 3D reconstruction from image sets. Used in under-resourced forensic laboratories in South...
- DBSML
- Detroit-Bone Sex/Maturity Logic: a logistic-regression-based classification system for sex estimation from cranial and postcranial linear measurements, developed at Wayne State University, providing...
- Explainability (ML Forensic)
- The capacity of a machine-learning model to articulate, in interpretable terms, the features driving its classification or estimation output. Required under Daubert,...
- LASSO Regression
- Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator: a regularised regression method that shrinks non-predictive coefficients toward zero, performing simultaneous feature selection and regression....
- Micro-CT
- Computed tomography at voxel sizes of 10 to 100 micrometres, resolving individual trabeculae and bone microarchitecture invisible to clinical CT or surface...
- Procrustes Superimposition
- The statistical procedure in geometric morphometrics that removes non-shape variation (translation, rotation, scale) from a set of landmark coordinates, leaving only shape...
- Structure-from-Motion (SfM)
- A photogrammetric technique in which overlapping images from a drone or camera, processed by software, generate a three-dimensional point cloud and textured...
- Thin-Plate Spline (TPS)
- A mathematical warping function used in geometric morphometrics to visualise the shape difference between a reference specimen and a target, deforming a...