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THE UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY Eric Snively A ... - Ohio University

THE UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY Eric Snively A ... - Ohio University

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individual organs with ideally efficient models, and to compare the collective<br />

performance of organs with models of compromised efficiency (Zweers 1979). It<br />

is also possible to correlate measured performance with morphometric attributes,<br />

such as dinging ability with size and zeugopodial morphology in lizards (Zani<br />

2000). These studies cm incorporate aspects of neurology (Zweers 1991 ) that<br />

are impossibie with extinct organisms, except by broad inference (Giffin 1990,<br />

1992; Martin et al. 1998).<br />

Assessments of absolute or realized performance are extremely difFicult with<br />

fossil animals. Therefore, hypotheses of function must be refined in focus<br />

through the accumulation of inductive data, using cornparisons with other extinct<br />

and extant taxa. For example, in this study of the arctometatarsus, a broad<br />

hypothesis of difference from other forms was tested through detailed<br />

morphological description and PCA of theropod third metatarsals. The<br />

distribution of ostealo~ical correlates suggested that ligaments arrested anterior<br />

displacement of MT Il1 in tyrannosaurids, in the manner of interosseous<br />

ligaments that bind the intercalating carpals of horses. This proposed function<br />

was refined into the tensile keystone hypothesis, and finite element analysis<br />

quantitatively tested the resulting kinematic model.<br />

Through this progression, a hypothesis of arctometatarsus function emerged<br />

that is based on thorough morphologicai understanding, and that is amenable to<br />

further quantitative falsification or support. I now briefiy recapitulate and<br />

synthesize these findings for tyrannosaurids, and discuss their implications for<br />

other theropods.

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