Body size, shape and ecology in tetrapods
Maher, Alice E Burin, Gustavo Cox, Philip G Maddox, Thomas W Cooper, Natalie Schachner, Emma R Bates, Karl T
Maher, Alice E
Burin, Gustavo
Cox, Philip G
Maddox, Thomas W
Cooper, Natalie
Schachner, Emma R
Bates, Karl T
Citations
Altmetric:
Advisors
Editors
Other Contributors
Affiliation
EPub Date
Issue Date
2022-07-27
Submitted Date
2021-01-27
Subject Terms
biomechanics
palaeontology
palaeontology
Collections
Research Projects
Organizational Units
Journal Issue
Other Titles
Abstract
Abstract - Body size and shape play fundamental roles in organismal function and it is expected that animals may possess body proportions that are well-suited to their ecological niche. Tetrapods exhibit a diverse array of body shapes, but to date this diversity in body proportions and its relationship to ecology have not been systematically quantified. Using whole-body skeletal models of 410 extinct and extant tetrapods, we show that allometric relationships vary across individual body segments thereby yielding changes in overall body shape as size increases. However, we also find statistical support for quadratic relationships indicative of differential scaling in small-medium versus large animals. Comparisons of locomotor and dietary groups highlight key differences in body proportions that may mechanistically underlie occupation of major ecological niches. Our results emphasise the pivotal role of body proportions in the broad-scale ecological diversity of tetrapods.
Citation
Maher, A.E., Burin, G., Cox, P.G. et al. Body size, shape and ecology in tetrapods. Nat Commun 13, 4340 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-32028-2
Publisher
Journal
Research Unit
PubMed ID
PubMed Central ID
Embedded videos
Type
Journal Article
Item Description
This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The linked article is the published version if the article.
NHM Repository
NHM Repository
Series/Report no.
ISSN
2041-1723
EISSN
2041-1723
ISBN
ISMN
GovDoc
Test Link
License
openAccess