Relationship between intracranial volume, basis cranii externa surface area and foramen magnum cross-sectional area

Purpose: the inferior surface of the skull is called basis cranii externa (bce). fm is on the bce. bony palate (bp) is formed by palate process of maxilla and horizontal lamina of palate bone. in literature there are a lot of studies about fm, icv, but there isn’t any study on bce, bp. the purpose of our study was to explore the relation between icv, bce surface area, fm cross-sectional area and bp area. materials and methods: the present study was conducted on 25 dry human skulls in the laboratories of pamukkale university, faculty of medicine department of anatomy. after taken photographs of skulls base , measurements were made on the computer screen. icv measurements were done by filling water into the cranial cavity from the fm. using point-counting (pc) method bce, fm and bp area were estimated on photographs. in area fraction method (af) how much amount of fm and bp spaced on bce were estimated. all the measurements and process were made double-blind. sex determination was performed based on 13 criteria in forensic for cranium. results: mean of icv for male 1307.5±100.17 cm^3, for female 1289.29±151.97 cm^3 calculated. mean of bce area for male 325.94±47.60 cm^2, for female 316.29± 39.36 cm^2 estimated. mean of fm area for male 18.28±4.23 cm^2, for female 17.14±2.61 cm^2 estimated. mean of bp area for male 58.72 ±13.78 cm^2, for female 57.29±9.93 cm^2 estimated. in male, using af method, fm had %5.60 area, bp had %18.01 area spaced on bce. in female using af method, fm had %5.52 area, bp had % 18.45 area spaced on bce. conclusion: as a result there is statistically important relationship between bce and fm, bce and bp, fm and bp areas. as a hypothesis, it was thought that there could have been a relationship between ich and bce areas; however, statistically there was not a significant relationship.