Divergent evolution of terrestrial locomotor abilities in extant Crocodylia.

ABSTRACT: Extant Crocodylia are exceptional because they employ almost the full range of quadrupedal footfall patterns ("gaits") used by mammals; including asymmetrical gaits such as galloping and bounding. Perhaps this capacity evolved in stem Crocodylomorpha, during the Triassic when taxa were smaller, terrestrial, and long-legged. However, confusion about which Crocodylia use asymmetrical gaits and why persists, impeding reconstructions of locomotor evolution. Our experimental gait analysis of locomotor kinematics across 42 individuals from 15 species of Crocodylia obtained 184 data points for a wide velocity range (0.15-4.35 ms^-1). Our results suggest either that asymmetrical gaits are ancestral for Crocodylia and lost in the alligator lineage, or that asymmetrical gaits evolved withi

SUBMITTER: Hutchinson JR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6917812 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature