"Which/whose" or "in which"?
I read of this sentence as follows:

--Lai and Walsh called earlobes in which the lowest point on the earlobe was the attachment point "attached," and they classified all other earlobes as "free." --( http://udel.edu/~mcdonald/mythearlobe.html )

The use of "in which" has confused me because it doesn't seems to fit into the sentence as either attributive, adverbial or complement.

Is it possible to rephrase the sentence as "...earlobes WHOSE/WHICH lowest point(S?) on the earlobe(S?) was(WERE?) the attachment point(S?) 'attached'..."?

Question

"Which/whose" or "in which"?
I read of this sentence as follows:

--Lai and Walsh called earlobes in which the lowest point on the earlobe was the attachment point "attached," and they classified all other earlobes as "free." --( http://udel.edu/~mcdonald/mythearlobe.html )

The use of "in which" has confused me because it doesn't seems to fit into the sentence as either attributive, adverbial or complement.

Is it possible to rephrase the sentence as "...earlobes WHOSE/WHICH lowest point(S?) on the earlobe(S?) was(WERE?) the attachment point(S?) 'attached'..."?

Answer

To be honest, I wouldn't understand that kind of English either!  I would say: "Lai and Walsh classified the earlobes where the lowest point of attachment was connected as 'attached'. The other earlobes they classified as 'free'.