Regional differences in vertebral shape along the axial skeleton in caecilians (Amphibia: Gymnophiona)
Anthony Herrel and Dominique Adriaens co-last authors.
Funding information: This study was supported by the Research Foundation, Flanders (Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek, grant 11D5819N), a Tournesol travel grant, the Royal Belgian Zoological Society and a European Union Marie Curie Fellowship (HPMF-CT-2001-01407), fieldwork and visiting fellowship of the Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek, Flanders, Belgium (FWO-Vl) to J.M. The special research fund of Ghent University (BOF-UGent) is acknowledged for financial support of the UGCT Centre of Expertise (BOF.EXP.2017.0007).
Abstract
Caecilians are elongate, limbless and annulated amphibians that, as far as is known, all have an at least partly fossorial lifestyle. It has been suggested that elongate limbless vertebrates show little morphological differentiation throughout the postcranial skeleton. However, relatively few studies have explored the axial skeleton in limbless tetrapods. In this study, we used μCT data and three-dimensional geometric morphometrics to explore regional differences in vertebral shape across a broad range of caecilian species. Our results highlight substantial differences in vertebral shape along the axial skeleton, with anterior vertebrae being short and bulky, whereas posterior vertebrae are more elongated. This study shows that despite being limbless, elongate tetrapods such as caecilians still show regional heterogeneity in the shape of individual vertebrae along the vertebral column. Further studies are needed, however, to understand the possible causes and functional consequences of the observed variation in vertebral shape in caecilians.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
The authors declare no competing or financial interests.
Open Research
DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT
The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
