Toe and plantar dermatoglyphics in upper Egyptians

Abstract EN

Foot of five hundred Upper Egyptian adults was examined for plantar dermatoglyphics and toe prints of 200 individuals were examined for toe dermatoglyphics.

The open field pattern is the most common pattern on the sole, as a whole, followed by loops, whorls then vestiges.

On the hallucal and third interdigital areas, loops are most common while in all other plantar areas the open field pattern was the most prevalent one.

On the toes of both feet of both sexes the fibular loop pattern was the most common while the tibial loop was the least occurring one.

On all individual toes, the fibular loop showed the highest frequency except the little toe where the most common pattern was the arch.

The third toe shows a peculiar high frequency of whorls and the little toe failed to show any whorls except in one female case.

Males showed high frequency of whorls (total and on most toes) than females while, females show higher frequency of arches.

The tibial count is consistently higher than fibular count in all toes of both sexes.

The highest tibial count appears in the big toe of both feet in males while in females, the highest count appears in the 3rd toe of the right foot and the big toe of left one.

Males show significantly higher total ridge counts and tibial counts than females in all toes except the little one.

This sex difference is similar to that observed in the fingers of all populations all over the world.

The results of this study are compared to those of other populations and the£ similarities observed were attributed to the universality of the basic factors underlying the control of dermal ridge formation in all populations.

The differences in some$ dermatoglyphic features could reflect the differences in the genetic background of different populations.