Doctoral Dissertation Improvement: 3-D Modeling of Lung Volume from Thoracic Form: A Geo-Morphometric Baseline for the Study of Thoracic Patterning in the Human Fossil Record

自上个世纪后半叶以来，伯格曼规则一直是尼安德特人颅后解剖学的大部分方面得到解释的工作假设。 因此，尼安德特人著名的桶形胸部在历史上被认为是对末次冰期最高峰期间以热量形式保存能量的需要的反应。 然而，气候并不是影响胸部图案的唯一因素。 运动模式、肺功能和活动模式以及其他相关动力学可能影响整体胸部bauplan。 尽管重点放在生态地理学的解释，很少有人试图定量评估的适应意义的胸部大小和形状的变化，在属人跨物种。 此外，关键的差距仍然存在于我们的理解的重要方面，现代胸腔的几何形状和它的关系，通风，能量学和气候适应生活人群。 因此，本研究探讨了活体人类骨骼胸廓形态与呼吸变量之间的三维关系，以促进我们对胸廓形态变化如何影响肺输出量的理解。 为了测试骨骼胸廓形状对呼吸变量的影响（例如，肺总容量、功能性残气量等）研究者将量化50名诊断正常的受试者和10名患有慢性阻塞性肺病（COPD）的推定桶形胸部的受试者的混合性别计算机断层扫描（CT）样本中胸部形态的变化，所有受试者的年龄都在20至60岁之间（最初根据IRB：199708651收集）。 然后将这种同质的活体CT样本的结果与最近人类变异极端的区域异质性混合性别骨骼样本（n=134）以及更完整的尼安德特人标本Kebara 2，Tabun C1，Shanidar 3和La Chapelle进行比较，以估计呼吸变量。 将通过使用两个样本的中轴骨骼以及肋软骨上的三维几何标志来实现该分析（在活体样本中）为了表征个体肋骨曲率和整体胸廓几何形状，结合活体样本的肺功能测试变量。这项研究独特地整合了临床和人类学方法，以解决已经研究过的问题。被临床医生广泛使用。 从这项研究中获得的结果将提供一个基线，为未来的研究现代和化石人类胸部的适应。 此外，由于胸廓发育和肺容量/通气是相关的;对这种关系的透彻理解对于治疗与活体人群中胸廓发育异常相关的问题至关重要（例如，强直性脊柱炎、重度脑瘫、脊髓性肌萎缩、胸壁重建等），肺/胸一致性差（如COPD）和/或肺移植。 这种与临床和解剖学研究的联系在生物人类学和古人类学中至关重要。 探索性地连接这些互补的学科提供了对人类变异的更大理解，这对学者和应用人类学家都有好处。

Since the last half of the past century, Bergmann's Rule has been the working hypothesis under which most aspects of Neandertal postcranial anatomy have been explained. Consequently, the Neandertal's reputed barrel-shaped thorax has been historically viewed as responsive to the need to conserve energy in the form of heat during the height of the last glacial maximum. However, climate is not the only factor that may affect thoracic patterning. Mode of locomotion, pulmonary fitness and activity patterns, as well as other related dynamics may have affected the overall thoracic bauplan. Despite the emphasis placed on ecogeographical explanations, few attempts have been made to quantitatively assess the adaptive significance of variation in chest size and shape across species within the genus Homo. Furthermore, critical gaps remain in our understanding of important aspects of modern thoracic geometry and its relation to ventilation, energetics, and climatic adaptation within living populations. Accordingly, this study examines the three dimensional relationships between skeletal thoracic form and respiratory variables in living humans to advance our understanding of how variation in thoracic form impact pulmonary output. To test the influence of skeletal thoracic shape on respiratory variables (e.g., total lung capacity, functional residual capacity, etc.) investigators will quantify variation in thoracic morphology within a mixed-sex computed tomography (CT) sample of 50 respiratorily normal subjects and 10 subjects with putative barrel-shaped chests from chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD), all between the ages of 20 and 60 (originally collected under IRB: 199708651). Results from this homogenous, living CT sample will then be compared to a regionally heterogeneous, mixed-sex skeletal sample from the extremes of recent human variation (n=134), as well as the more complete Neandertal specimens Kebara 2, Tabun C1, Shanidar 3, and La Chapelle, in order to estimate respiratory variables. This analysis will be achieved through the use of three dimensional geometric landmarks on the axial skeleton of both samples, as well as the costochondral cartilages (in the living sample) in order to characterize individual rib curvature and overall thoracic geometry, in conjunction with lung function test variables from the living sample.This study uniquely integrates clinical and anthropological methodologies to address issues that have been studied extensively by clinicians. The results obtained from this study will provide a baseline for future studies of modern and fossil human thoracic adaptation. Moreover, since thoracic development and pulmonary capacity/ventilation are associated; a thorough understanding of this relationship is crucial to treating problems associated with abnormal thoracic development in living populations (e.g., ankylosing spondylitis, severe cerebral palsy, spinal muscular atrophy, chest wall reconstruction, etc.), poor lung/thoracic concordance (such as is the case in COPD) and/or lung transplantation. This connection to clinical and anatomical studies is crucial in biological anthropology and paleoanthropology. Explicitly bridging these complimentary disciplines provides a greater appreciation of human variation that benefits both academics and applied anthropologists alike.