Mammalian Evolutionary Morphology A Tribute to Frederick S. Szalay

About this book

Mammalian Evolutionary Morphology acknowledges and celebrates the contributions of Dr. Frederick S. Szalay to the field of Mammalian Evolutionary Morphology. Professor Szalay has published about 200 articles, six monographs, and six books on this subject. He is a strong advocate for biologically and evolutionarily meaningful character analysis, which, in his view, can be accomplished only through an integrated strategy of functional, adaptational, and historical analysis.

The articles in Mammalian Evolutionary Morphology employ this strategy to address a wide range of problems in mammalian and primate evolution.

Contents

Section 1: Non-primate Mammals
1. Earliest evidence of Deltatheroida (Mammalia: Metatheria) from the Early Cretaceous of North America Brian M. Davis, Richard L. Cifelli, and Zofia Kielan-Jaworowska
2. Evolution of hind limb proportions in kangaroos (Marsupialia: Macropodoidea) Benjamin P. Kear, Michael S. Y. Lee, Wayne R. Gerdtz, and Tim F. Flannery
3. Changing views in paleontology: the story of a giant (Megatherium, Xenarthra) Christine Argot
4. Evolutionary morphology of the Tenrecoidea (Mammalia) forelimb skeleton Justine A. Salton and Eric J. Sargis
5. Postcranial morphology of Apheliscus and Haplomylus (Condylarthra, Apheliscidae): evidence for a Paleocene Holarctic origin of Macroscelidea Tonya A. Penkrot, Shawn P. Zack, Kenneth D. Rose, and Jonathan I. Bloch
6. Postcranial skeleton of the Upper Paleocene (Itaboraian) "Condylarthra" (Mammalia) of the Itaborai Basin, Brazil Lilian P. Berqvist
7. Postcranial osteology of mammals from Salla, Bolivia (late Oligocene): form, function, and phylogenetic implications Bruce J. Shockey and Frederico Anaya
8. Evolution of the proximal third phalanx in Oligocene-Miocene equids, and the utility of phalangeal indices in phylogeny reconstruction Jay A. O'Sullivan
9. Adaptive zones and the pinniped ankle: a three-dimensional quantitative analysis of carnivoran tarsal evolution P. David Polly

Section 2: Primates
10. The biogeographic origins of Primates and Euprimates: East, West, North, or South of Eden? Mary T. Silcox
11. Evaluating the mitten-gliding hypothesis for Paromomyidae and Micromomyidae (Mammalia, "Plesiadapiformes") using comparative functional morphology of new Paleogene skeletons Douglas M. Boyer and Jonathan I. Bloch
12. Morphological diversity in the skulls of large adapines (Primates, Adapiformes) and its systematic implications Marc Godinot and Sebastien Couette
13. Primate tibiae from the middle Eocene Shanghuang fissure-fillings of eastern China Marian Dagosto, Daniel L. Gebo, Xijun Ni, Tao Qi, and K. Christopher Beard
14. Rooneyia, postorbital closure, and the beginnings of the Age of Anthropoidea Alfred L. Rosenberger, Russell Hogg, and Sai Man Wong
15. Epitensoric position of the chorda tympani in Anthropoidea: a new synapomorphic character, with remarks on the fissura Glaseri in Primates Wolfgang Maier
16. Evolutionary morphology of the guenon postcranium and its taxonomic implications Eric J. Sargis, Carl J. Terranova, and Daniel L. Gebo
17. Analysis of selected hominoid joint surfaces using laser scanning and geometric morphometrics: a preliminary report William E. H. Harcourt-Smith, Melissa Tallman, Stephen R. Frost, David F. Wiley, F. James Rohlf, and Eric Delson
18. Comparative primate bone microstructure: records of life history, function, and phylogeny Johanna Warshaw

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Biography

Eric J. Sargis: (Ph.D., City University of New York [CUNY], a part of the New York Consortium in Evolutionary Primatology [NYCEP]) is an Associate Professor of Anthropology. His dissertation research was on the functional postcranial morphology of treeshrews (Scandentia) and its significance for understanding primate supraordinal relationships and the phylogenetics of archontan mammals. Eric has also worked on the evolutionary morphology of Old World monkeys (Primates, Cercopithecidae) and marsupials. He has conducted fieldwork in Malaysia (1994), Indonesia (1994), Ethiopia (1996, 1997), Bolivia (2001), Peru (2001, 2002, 2003), Madagascar (2003), Brazil (2005), and Cambodia (2006). Eric is also an Assistant Curator of Mammalogy at the Peabody Museum of Natural History, the Treasurer of the Society for the Study of Mammalian Evolution (SSME), and the Book Review Editor of the Journal of Mammalian Evolution (JME).

Marian Dagosto: The focus of her research efforts is the understanding of the functional, adaptive, and phylogenetic significance of the anatomy of the limb skeleton in extant and fossil prosimian primates. The fossil members of this group, the Adapidae and Omomyidae, are the earliest known primates, and all living primates are thought to have descended from these forms. This group of primates, then, can provide clues to the early adaptive history of the order, and help identify the probable selective forces which shaped the basic morphology of this group. She has been concentrating on two primary areas of inquiry in this field. The first is the functional analysis of the limb anatomy of fossil primates, including description of newly discovered primate remains, an analysis of the probable locomotor behaviors of fossil species, and the phylogenetic implications of their morphological features. Current projects in this area include analysis of the postcranium of the omomyid primates and of the Eocene Chinese eosimiids. The second area is the "ecomorphology" of primate locomotion: the documentation of locomotor behavior and its ecological context (relationship to food resources, forest type) and its relationship to interspecific differences in morphology in living primates. Her current project in this area is the positional behavior of the Philippine tarsier, Tarsius syrichta. She is also investigating geographic variation in skull size and shape in the genus Tarsius and its implications for the phylogeny and biogeographic history of these primates.