4.2 Article

The Shape of Sound: a Geometric Morphometrics Approach to Laryngeal Functional Morphology

Journal

JOURNAL OF MAMMALIAN EVOLUTION
Volume 27, Issue 3, Pages 577-590

Publisher

SPRINGER
DOI: 10.1007/s10914-019-09466-9

Keywords

Source-filter theory; Bioacoustics; Rodents; Ventral pouch; Vocal production

Funding

  1. National Science Foundation [1754332]
  2. Division Of Integrative Organismal Systems
  3. Direct For Biological Sciences [1754332] Funding Source: National Science Foundation

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Diversification of animal vocalizations plays a key role in behavioral evolution and speciation. Vocal organ morphology represents an important source of acoustic variation, yet its small size, complex shape, and absence of homologous landmarks pose major challenges to comparative analyses. Here, we use a geometric morphometric approach based on geometrically homologous landmarks to quantify shape variation of laryngeal cartilages of four rodent genera representing three families. Reconstructed cartilages of the larynx from contrast-enhanced micro-CT images were quantified by variable numbers of three-dimensional landmarks placed on structural margins and major surfaces. Landmark sets were superimposed using generalized Procrustes analysis prior to statistical analysis. Correlations among pairwise Procrustes distances were used to identify the minimum number of landmarks necessary to fully characterize shape variation. We found that the five species occupy distinct positions in morphospace, with variation explained in part by phylogeny, body size, and differences in vocal production mechanisms. Our findings provide a foundation for quantifying the contribution of vocal organ morphology to acoustic diversification.

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