Macroevolutionary patterns in the evolution of the skull in theropod dinosaurs: a morphogenetic approach
Final Report Abstract
Studies of skull shape of different groups of archosaurs using geometric morphometrics resulted in numerous new insights into skull morphospace and the functional and evolutionary aspects that might have determined skull shape in these animals. Whereas artifacts of restoration and reconstructions of skulls might only influence the results of morphometric analyses in extreme cases, innerspecific variation might be as large as intraspecific variation in skull shape in closely related taxa. Both functional constraints and phylogenetic relationships strongly influence skull shape in theropod dinosaurs, and functional constraints also play an important role in innerspecific and ontogenetic variation in recent crocodiles. Basic ontogenetic changes (relative elongation of snout, relative reduction of orbit size, relative shortening of postorbital skull part) are similar in different archosaur groups, and heterochronic changes seem to have played an important role in the evolution of skull shape in archosaurs. Peramorphic changes are found in crocodiles and basal theropods, often in relation to overall body size, whereas paedomorphic changes play an important role in coelurosaurs on the lineage towards birds, already long before the origin of Avialae. Cranial disparity in pterosaurs is broadly correlated with morphometric changes in the postcranial skeleton, so that different disparity proxies converge on a similar signal.
Publications
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2012. Do different disparity proxies converge on a common signal? Insights from the cranial morphometrics and evolutionary history of Pterosauria (Diapsida: Archosauria). Journal of Evolutionary Biology 25: 904-915
Foth C, Brusatte SL, Butler, RJ
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2013. Macroevolutionary and morphofunctional patterns in theropod skulls: a morphometric approach. Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 58: 1-16
Foth C, Rauhut OWM
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2013. Ontogenetic, macroevolutionary and morphofunctional patterns in archosaur skulls: a morphometric approach. Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, München. PhD thesis
Foth C
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2013. The good, the bad, and the ugly: the influence of skull reconstructions and intraspecific variability in studies of cranial morphometrics in theropods and basal saurischians. PLoS ONE 8: e72007
Foth C, Rauhut OWM
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2015. Intraspecific variation in the skull morphology of the black caiman Melanosuchus niger (Alligatoridae, Caimaninae). Acta Zoologica 96: 1-13
Foth C, Bona P, Desojo JB
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2016. Cranial ontogenetic variation in early saurischians and the role of heterochrony in the diversification of predatory dinosaurs. PeerJ 4: e1589
Foth C, Hedrick BP, Ezcurra MD
