Determining age at death is one of the first assessments made of a human skeleton. In juveniles, this is straightforward: the body is still maturing and the bones and teeth develop on a fairly predictable schedule. But how do scientists assess the age of death in adults? For over 70 years, physical anthropologists have used cranial suture fusion – the rate at which the skull’s plates mesh – as one way to estimate age for adults. Researcher Rose Drew, however, suggests this relationship is hardly so simple. Here she reports on her findings.

CWA takes a look at the renovation project underway at Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum