Because MLIA can be detected from partial skeletal remains, it is useful in the field of anthropology. Anthropologically-interesting human remains often have relatively well preserved skeletons, but no soft tissues or intact DNA. This makes it hard to determine relationships between the deceased individuals. MLIA is sometimes related to inbreeding, so the presence of MLIA in many members of a large collection of remains can indicate that the population that lived there was relatively inbred. This technique has been used to study a group of Neolithic farmers. Non-metric morphological traits, also known as epigenetic or anatomical variants, are a great tool for detecting individuals who are genetically related in historic populations if DNA is not well preserved. The method used is non-metric cranial and dental traits, which has already been tested on several burial sites. Identifying individuals who are genetically related from past populations is very important in order to determine if the families share a number of characteristics and phenotypical traits. Traits that are used for kinship analysis must be determine by genetic factors, must be rare in the general population, and the individual traits must be genetically independent from each other. The traits that are closely examined include: anatomical variants of tooth crowns and roots; shape, size, number, structure, and position of the teeth.
Maxillary lateral incisor agenesis
Midline cervical cleft
Maxillary hypoplasia
Hemifacial microsomia
Retrognathism
Shovel-shaped incisors
Regional odontodysplasia
Condylar hypoplasia