Raman spectroscopy identified fingernail compositional differences between sexes and age-related changes but not handedness or fingers in a healthy cohort

This is the experimental data collected and analysed for the paper
(10.1371/journal.pone.0329092) "Raman spectroscopy identified
fingernail compositional differences between sexes and age-related changes
but not handedness or fingers in a healthy cohort", in which we
discovered the differences of fingernail compositions using Raman
spectroscopy. Twenty male and 20 twenty female participants without known
musculoskeletal or dermatological diseases donated nail clippings from
each finger. The clippings were cleaned, and Raman spectra collected and
analysed using a standardised protocol. Females have higher intensities of
disulphide, protein, and lipid bands, particularly in their 40s, than
males. Age-related changes were prominent in female nails, especially in
sulphur-related bands. No significant differences were observed between
nails from the left and right hands or among different fingers. The raw
spectral data were baseline corrected and normalised before the
statistical analyses and outliers and poor quality spectra were removed in
the dataset. Please contact Dr Nai-Hao Yin ([e-mail]) or Dr
Jemma Kerns ([e-mail]) for queries.Description