I. the origin of species by means of natural selection

http://academic.oup.com/auk/article-pdf/102/3/661/30080634/auk0661.pdf

Scaling: why is animal size so important?

Morphometric tools for landmark data: geometry and biology

The site of Dmanisi, Georgia, has yielded an impressive sample of hominid cranial and postcranial remains, documenting the presence of Homo outside Africa around 1.8 million years ago. Here we report on a new cranium from Dmanisi (D4500) that, together with its mandible (D2600), represents the world's first completely preserved adult hominid skull from the early Pleistocene. D4500/D2600 combines a small braincase (546 cubic centimeters) with a large prognathic face and exhibits close morphological affinities with the earliest known Homo fossils from Africa. The Dmanisi sample, which now comprises five crania, provides direct evidence for wide morphological variation within and among early Homo paleodemes. This implies the existence of a single evolving lineage of early Homo, with phylogeographic continuity across continents.

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/sci/342/6156/326.full.pdf

A complete skull from Dmanisi, Georgia, and the evolutionary biology of early Homo.

Inter-individual variation in facial shape is one of the most noticeable phenotypes in humans, and it is clearly under genetic regulation; however, almost nothing is known about the genetic basis of normal human facial morphology. We therefore conducted a genome-wide association study for facial shape phenotypes in multiple discovery and replication cohorts, considering almost ten thousand individuals of European descent from several countries. Phenotyping of facial shape features was based on landmark data obtained from three-dimensional head magnetic resonance images (MRIs) and twodimensional portrait images. We identified five independent genetic loci associated with different facial phenotypes, suggesting the involvement of five candidate genes—PRDM16, PAX3, TP63, C5orf50, and COL17A1—in the determination of the human face. Three of them have been implicated previously in vertebrate craniofacial development and disease, and the remaining two genes potentially represent novel players in the molecular networks governing facial development. Our finding at PAX3 influencing the position of the nasion replicates a recent GWAS of facial features. In addition to the reported GWA findings, we established links between common DNA variants previously associated with NSCL/P at 2p21, 8q24, 13q31, and 17q22 and normal facial-shape variations based on a candidate gene approach. Overall our study implies that DNA variants in genes essential for craniofacial development contribute with relatively small effect size to the spectrum of normal variation in human facial morphology. This observation has important consequences for future studies aiming to identify more genes involved in the human facial morphology, as well as for potential applications of DNA prediction of facial shape such as in future forensic applications.

/pdf/a-genome-wide-association-study-identifies-five-loci-4yur7l2jv3.pdf

A Genome-Wide Association Study Identifies Five Loci Influencing Facial Morphology in Europeans

Geometric morphometrics (GM) has increasingly become an important tool in assessing and studying shape variation in a wide variety of taxa. While the GM toolkit has unparalleled power to quantify shape, its use in studies of functional morphology have been questioned. Here, we assess the state of the field of GM and provide an overview of the techniques available to assess shape, including aspects of visualization, statistical analysis, phylogenetic control, and more. Additionally, we briefly review the history of functional morphology and summarize the main tools available to the functional morphologist. We explore the intersection of geometric morphometrics and functional morphology and we suggest ways that we may be able to move forward in profitably combining these two research areas. Finally, this paper provides a brief introduction to the papers in this special issue and highlights the ways in which the contributing authors have approached the intersection of GM and functional morphology. Anat Rec, 298:5–28, 2015. V C 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

/pdf/form-function-and-geometric-morphometrics-16kj5vlhms.pdf

Form, Function, and Geometric Morphometrics

Temporal bone shape has been shown to reflect molecular phylogenetic relationships among hominoids and offers significant morphological detail for distinguishing taxa. Although it is generally accepted that temporal bone shape, like other aspects of morphology, has an underlying genetic component, the relative influence of genetic and environmental factors is unclear. To determine the impact of genetic differentiation and environmental variation on temporal bone morphology, we used three-dimensional geometric morphometric techniques to evaluate temporal bone variation in 11 modern human populations. Population differences were investigated by discriminant function analysis, and the strength of the relationships between morphology, neutral molecular distance, geographic distribution, and environmental variables were assessed by matrix correlation comparisons. Significant differences were found in temporal bone shape among all populations, and classification rates using cross-validation were relatively high. Comparisons of morphological distances to molecular distances based on short tandem repeats (STRs) revealed a significant correlation between temporal bone shape and neutral molecular distance among Old World populations, but not when Native Americans were included. Further analyses suggested a similar pattern for morphological variation and geographic distribution. No significant correlations were found between temporal bone shape and environmental variables: temperature, annual rainfall, latitude, or altitude. Significant correlations were found between temporal bone size and both temperature and latitude, presumably reflecting Bergmann's rule. Thus, temporal bone morphology appears to partially follow an isolation by distance model of evolution among human populations, although levels of correlation show that a substantial component of variation is unexplained by factors considered here.

Genetic, geographic, and environmental correlates of human temporal bone variation.

Variation and diversity in Homo erectus: a 3D geometric morphometric analysis of the temporal bone

Objectives
This study compares two- and three-dimensional morphometric data to determine the extent to which intra- and interobserver and intermethod error influence the outcomes of statistical analyses.

Materials and Methods
Data were collected five times for each method and observer on 14 anthropoid crania using calipers, a MicroScribe, and 3D models created from NextEngine and microCT scans. ANOVA models were used to examine variance in the linear data at the level of genus, species, specimen, observer, method, and trial. Three-dimensional data were analyzed using geometric morphometric methods; principal components analysis was employed to examine how trials of all specimens were distributed in morphospace and Procrustes distances among trials were calculated and used to generate UPGMA trees to explore whether all trials of the same individual grouped together regardless of observer or method.

Results
Most variance in the linear data was at the genus level, with greater variance at the observer than method levels. In the 3D data, interobserver and intermethod error were similar to intraspecific distances among Callicebus cupreus individuals, with interobserver error being higher than intermethod error. Generally, taxa separate well in morphospace, with different trials of the same specimen typically grouping together. However, trials of individuals in the same species overlapped substantially with one another.

Conclusion
Researchers should be cautious when compiling data from multiple methods and/or observers, especially if analyses are focused on intraspecific variation or closely related species, as in these cases, patterns among individuals may be obscured by interobserver and intermethod error. Conducting interobserver and intermethod reliability assessments prior to the collection of data is recommended.

Claire E. Terhune

Papers

Form, Function, and Geometric Morphometrics

Genetic, geographic, and environmental correlates of human temporal bone variation.

Variation and diversity in Homo erectus: a 3D geometric morphometric analysis of the temporal bone

Error in geometric morphometric data collection: Combining data from multiple sources.

Jaw-muscle architecture and mandibular morphology influence relative maximum jaw gapes in the sexually dimorphic Macaca fascicularis