X-rays could tell Chinese Olympic gymnasts' ages, scientists says

Don't bother with those government-issued passports or birth certificates.

Go for the X-rays.

For all the global hand-wringing over how international gymnastics officials will ever figure out whether three members of the Chinese women's team were old enough to compete, doctors and forensics experts said it's actually not too difficult.

The science of determining age is has been honed by decades of treating patients with growth disorders, identifying youthful homicide victims and determining the deportation status of illegal immigrants.

"It would be relatively easy," said Dr. David Senn, a forensic odontologist at the University of Texas Health Sciences Center who has analyzed numerous X-rays of immigrants apprehended at the border.

The science is based on measuring the growth of bones and teeth as children mature. Decades of data have been distilled into detailed tables recording the precise size and shape of skeletal components broken down by age, sex and race.

The task is so straightforward that Dr. Peter Hampl, president of the American Board of Forensic Odontology, said the Chinese government should just consent to X-rays and let the films speak for themselves.

"If there is nothing to be afraid of, let their kids be X-rayed," he said. "It's almost incriminating if they don't."

It may seem strange that amid the outsized pageantry of the Beijing Games, the biggest controversy has surrounded three tiny Chinese gymnasts whose combined weight is 216 pounds.

The ages of He Kexin, Yang Yilin and Jiang Yuyuan came into question weeks ago after the discovery of online registration records listing birth dates that would make all three girls 14 years old. Olympic rules require that a gymnast be at least 16 during the year the Games are held. The government attempted to put the issue to rest by producing passports that declared the girls met the age requirement.

The controversy reached Olympian proportions after the Chinese team beat the American gymnasts in the team competition. In addition to the team gold, He edged American Nastia Liukin for the top prize in uneven bars by a tiebreaker, and Yang won the bronze medal in that event and in the all-around competition.

After new complaints surfaced, the International Olympic Committee announced Friday that it was asking the International Gymnastics Federation to reexamine the Chinese gymnasts' age.