Abstract: With recently published Chinese books and workshops on body composition methods, biological anthropologists in China are now increasingly interested in applying body composition methods in their research. This paper provided a brief review on the historical contributions by anthropologists, such as Jindr?ich Matiegka, and Stanley Marion Garn, to the development of body composition methods. In addition, Dr. Garn’s work was used as an example to inspire body composition research by biological anthropologists in China. The author discussed the utility of body composition measurements in the research of biological anthropology, and described the basic theory and concept of body composition as well as the recent changes in body composition measurements: the advancement in imaging techniques, using imaging techniques as the “gold standard” to evaluate other body composition measurements, the advantage of Dual-energy X-ray Absorptiometry, the broad use of Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis, and the presence of different body composition methods. The author also compared the strengths and limitations of commonly used body composition methods, and pointed out that body composition measurement is a natural extension of anthropometry, and has a long history with biological anthropology. As such, Chinese biological anthropologists should increase the application of body composition methods in research in order to better understand human variation and the relationship of human variation to health, disease, and biomedicine. By doing so, biological anthropology may increase its contribution to today’s society.

Key words: Body composition; Biological anthropology; Anthropometry