Bone shape and microstructure are influenced by the mechanical loads they experience during life. Their study is thus important to the reconstruction of past human behavior and adaptation. However, such research is limited by a knowledge of variability in modern humans. Novel microscopy and imaging techniques will be employed to study bone architectural variability in the human mid-shaft femur. Factors investigated will include collagen fiber orientations within bone, the mineralization and density of the bone tissue, the histological organization of bone, and the cross-sectional geometry of the femur. These factors will be examined by means of quantitative analysis of images derived from both light and scanning electron microscopy. As all of these factors contribute to the overall architecture of the bone, and potential compensatory relationships are expected to exist between them. These relationships will be quantified, along with their variability with age and sex using a large adult autopsy sample. This intra-population study of variability in bone architecture will provide important data for the study of age-related bone diseases such as osteoporosis. The techniques used, and the data obtained in this study, will provide a basis for future comparative research on variability of bone organization among contemporary populations, both adult and juvenile, as well as among archaeological and fossil samples. Such research will, in turn, encourage new hypotheses concerning the role of environment, nutrition, biomechanics, and evolutionary history on bone architectural variability.
