Doctoral Dissertation Research: An analysis of the evolution of shape change trajectories using 3D geometric morphometrics

在密切相关的动物物种中，生长和发育模式的差异往往导致成年解剖结构的差异。本博士论文项目将研究许多灵长类物种的颅骨解剖，考虑生长发育轨迹，并利用这些数据重建祖先物种的生长发育轨迹。该项目将推进有关灵长类动物适应和生活史的知识，并将为研究生长、发育和解剖学产生新的形状测量工具，这些工具将在许多生物学学科中发挥作用。本科生将参与形状测量的处理和分析，从而教授他们几何形态计量学、数学和统计分析方面的技术技能。该项目还将支持公共科学推广活动，以便与更广泛的受众分享这些生物学概念和方法上的进展。本研究的目的是研究进化如何影响颅面生长和发育，从而产生在卡他鼻虫中观察到的形态多样性。几何形态计量学方法将用于测量26种现存卡他林物种的个体发生颅骨系列，并从中计算个体发生形状变化的轨迹。为了解决祖先形态问题，本项目将重建所有现存卡塔林动物的最后共同祖先（LCA）的颅骨个体发生轨迹，以及蠓类、人科动物和人科动物的最后共同祖先（LCA）的颅骨个体发生轨迹，以便与现存分类群的祖先轨迹进行比较。由于成人形态主要是生长和发育模式的产物，这些祖先的个体发育轨迹将用于确定成年卡他龙祖先的颅骨形状。该项目还将通过评估大小作为“最小进化阻力线”的假设来解决头骨大小在成人形态产生中的作用，即大小变化可能是适应和多样化的第一步，大小比形状对环境变化的反应更快。利用系统发育比较方法的最新进展，这一假设将通过直接比较卡他鼻颅骨个体发生形状变化的载体，并通过检查卡他鼻颅骨大小和颅骨大小-形状关系的进化速率变化的系统发育来验证。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

In closely related animal species, differences in patterns of growth and development are often responsible for differences in adult anatomy. This doctoral dissertation project will study cranial anatomy in a number of primate species, taking into account trajectories of growth and development, and use those data to reconstruct the growth and development trajectories of ancestral species. The project will advance knowledge about primate adaptation and life history, and will also generate novel shape measurement tools for studying growth, development and anatomy that will be useful across a number of biological disciplines. Undergraduate students will participate in the processing and analysis of shape measurements, thereby teaching them technical skills in geometric morphometrics, mathematics, and statistical analysis. The project will also support public science outreach activities to share these biological concepts and methodological advances with a broader audience. The objective of this investigation is to examine how evolution has shaped craniofacial growth and development to produce the morphological diversity observed in catarrhines. Geometric morphometric methods will be used to measure an ontogenetic cranial series of 26 extant catarrhine species, from which trajectories of ontogenetic shape change will be calculated. To address ancestral morphologies, this project will reconstruct the cranial ontogenetic trajectory of the last common ancestor (LCA) of all extant catarrhines, as well as those of the LCA of cercopithecoids, hominoids, and hominins, allowing for a comparison of ancestral trajectories with those of extant taxa. As adult morphologies are largely the product of patterns of growth and development, these ancestral ontogenetic trajectories will be used to make determinations about the cranial shapes of adult catarrhine ancestors. This project will also address the role of cranial size in the production of adult morphologies through an evaluation of the hypothesis of size as a 'line of least evolutionary resistance,' whereby size changes may be a first step in adaptation and diversification, with size responding more quickly than shape to environmental change. Using the latest advances in phylogenetic comparative methods, this hypothesis will be tested through direct comparisons of vectors of ontogenetic shape change in the catarrhine skull, and by examining the catarrhine phylogeny for rate shifts in the evolution of cranial size and in cranial size-shape relationships.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.