Many of us may feel , and look , older than our years . But our biological age – which can vary significantly from our real age – often remains a mystery . Now scientists say they can accurately estimate biological age by creating a 3D scan of wrinkles and other facial features . Scientists say they have discovered a way of finding out that age by creating a 3D scan of facial features . These 3D images are a composite of two sets of male faces , showing the average facial structure for each age group . The left image shows the average of the 17-29 year-old man , and the right 60-77 year-old man . Mouth width , nose width and the distance between the mouth and nose increase with age , while the corners of the eyes start to droop . Young faces are smoother and thinner , while people with older faces had more fat build up and fuller cheeks , as well as sagging skin . They also discovered signs in people 's blood associated with the markers of aging that appear on people 's faces . Women with older-looking faces , for example , tended to have higher levels of 'bad ' cholesterol , the study found . Men older-aged faces often had lower levels of albumin in their blood samples , a protein found in plasma . Jing-Dong Han and colleagues at the Chinese Academy of Sciences collected 3D images of 332 Chinese people between the ages of 17 and 77 using a camera called the 3dMDface System . Using the data , the authors created a map of the ageing human face and were able to develop a method to find patterns of ageing based on certain facial features . According to the study , mouth width , nose width and the distance between the mouth and nose increase with age , while the corners of the eyes start to droop . Young faces are smoother and thinner , while people with older faces had more fat build up and fuller cheeks , as well as sagging skin . They also discovered signs in people 's blood associated with the markers of aging that appear on people 's faces . Women with older-looking faces , for example , tended to have higher levels of 'bad ' cholesterol , the study found . Men older-aged faces often had lower levels of albumin in their blood samples , a protein found in plasma . '3D facial images can really tell your biological age , ' the study 's senior researcher Jing-Dong Han , told LiveScience . 'It 's really more accurate than a physical exam . ' Jing-Dong Han and colleagues at the Chinese Academy of Sciences collected 3D images of 332 Chinese people between the ages of 17 and 77 using a camera called the 3dMDface System . The left image shows the average face of a 17-29 year-old women , and the right 60-77 year-old female . Pictured is a heat map of weight values for older men ( right ) and women ( left ) . Young faces are smoother and thinner , while people with older faces had more fat build up and fuller cheeks , as well as sagging skin . They found that up until the age of 40 , people of the same chronological age could differ by up to six years in facial age . Over the age of 40 , variation in facial age increased . The technique was used to identify participants who were physiologically ageing faster or more slowly than their chronological age would suggest . These results were supported by indicators for health and age in blood samples taken from the volunteers . The researchers say their model could help identify people who age physiologically faster and tailor treatment to their needs . The results could be different among different ethnicities , and the researchers now hope to conduct a further study among a sample that includes Americans . Pictured are the average profiles of the predicted slow-ager , well-predicted and fast-ager female and malesubjects in age groups younger than 40 years old . Mouth width , nose width and the distance between the mouth and nose increase with age , while the corners of the eyes start to droop .
Scientists scanned faces of 332 Chinese people aged between 17 and 77 . They were able to find patterns of ageing based on various facial features . Nose width and distance between mouth and nose increased with age . The researchers also found that the shape of a person’s eyes changed over time, as did their size.