Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Fig. 6.4.
An X-ray of the healthy structure of right wrist bones - view from behind
The hand bone structure of either one selected hand or both hands can form the
basis of a biometric analysis as differences in the hand structure can be present in
either both hands or just one. This analysis consists in measurements taken with a
special reader which, during the procedure, records a 3D image of the hand, stor-
ing its characteristic traits. These records are kept in the database as patterns as-
signed to individual people. Every such pattern is unique and unanimously identi-
fies the person to which it is assigned. If there is no pattern in the system for the
person currently undergoing the biometric analysis, this may lead to either no pat-
tern being assigned to the person, or to his/her wrong identification. The wrong
identification may also occur if the biometric pattern stored in the database is not
updated, because as the time passes and the person ages, his/her hand also ages
and the following changes may occur in the hand:
•
hand shape changes;
•
changes of its span;
•
changes in the size of areas between bones.
Modern biometric systems account for changes in the hand geometry caused by
the time factor (the passage of time).
What seems particularly interesting is research combining the above traditional
biometric analysis technologies with cognitive analysis techniques. This is be-
cause techniques consisting in the semantic analysis of the hand shape based on
the analysis of lesions (or the lack thereof) found within the hand can be supple-
mented with a biometric analysis.
Individual records contained in cognitive systems may contain (assign) infor-
mation on hand biometrics, i.e. its shape, the length of particular hand bones, bone
thicknesses, the relative location of bones and the hand span. It should be noted
that the cognitive analysis of hand bone images is based on selecting the right lin-
guistic formalism for a graph description of hand bones. This description is writ-
ten based on the healthy location of hand bones for:
