Topic
Leithia
About: Leithia is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 7 publications have been published within this topic receiving 96 citations.
Papers
TL;DR: The bone tissue and the skeletochronological data of the sampled island species suggest the presence of various modes of bone histological modification and mammalian life history evolution on islands to depend on factors of island evolution such as island size, distance from mainland, climate, phylogeny, and time of evolution.
Abstract: The interest in mammalian palaeohistology has increased dramatically in the last two decades. Starting in 1849 via descriptive approaches, it has been demonstrated that bone tissue and vascularisation types correlate with several biological variables such as ontogenetic stage, growth rate, and ecology. Mammalian bone displays a large variety of bone tissues and vascularisation patterns reaching from lamellar or parallel-fibred to fibrolamellar or woven-fibred bone, depending on taxon and individual age. Here we systematically review the knowledge and methods on cynodont and mammalian bone microstructure as well as palaeohistology and discuss potential future research fields and techniques. We present new data on the bone microstructure of two extant marsupial species and of several extinct continental and island placental mammals. Extant marsupials display mainly parallel-fibred primary bone with radial and oblique but mainly longitudinal vascular canals. Three juvenile specimens of the dwarf island hippopotamid Hippopotamus minor from the Late Pleistocene of Cyprus show reticular to plexiform fibrolamellar bone. The island murid Mikrotia magna from the Late Miocene of Gargano, Italy displays parallel-fibred primary bone with reticular vascularisation and strong remodelling in the middle part of the cortex. Leithia sp., the dormouse from the Pleistocene of Sicily, is characterised by a primary bone cortex consisting of lamellar bone and a high amount of compact coarse cancellous bone. The bone cortex of the fossil continental lagomorph Prolagus oeningensis and three fossil species of insular Prolagus displays mainly parallel-fibred primary bone and reticular, radial as well as longitudinal vascularisation. Typical for large mammals, secondary bone in the giant rhinocerotoid Paraceratherium sp. from the Late Oligocene of Turkey is represented by dense Haversian bone. The skeletochronological features of Sinomegaceros yabei, a large-sized deer from the Pleistocene of Japan closely related to Megaloceros, indicate a high growth rate. These examples and the synthesis of existing data show the potential of bone microstructure to reveal essential information on life history evolution. The bone tissue and the skeletochronological data of the sampled island species suggest the presence of various modes of bone histological modification and mammalian life history evolution on islands to depend on factors of island evolution such as island size, distance from mainland, climate, phylogeny, and time of evolution.
85 citations
TL;DR: In the Hyblean Plateau limnic fossil remains of large mammals have been collected and these represent the oldest found in a well-established Pleistocene stratigraphic succession in Sicily as mentioned in this paper.
26 citations
TL;DR: A new species of Tytonidae, Tyto mourerchauvireae, is described from the Sicilian cave deposits of Spinagallo, Luparello and Marasa, which have yielded a common vertebrate fossil assemblages referred to the early Middle Pleistocene as discussed by the authors.
22 citations
TL;DR: It is suggested that body size increases in insular giant dormice were accompanied by the evolutionary divergence of feeding adaptations, which complements other evidence of ecological divergence in these taxa, which span predominantly faunivorous to herbivorous diets.
Abstract: Insular gigantism—evolutionary increases in body size from small-bodied mainland ancestors—is a conceptually significant, but poorly studied, evolutionary phenomenon. Gigantism is widespread on Med...
9 citations
3 Jul 2020
TL;DR: In this paper, a composite skull of the partial crania was then reconstructed with the use of merging and warping techniques, resulting in the best approximation to the complete skull morphology of this species thus far.
Abstract: The endemic dormouse Leithia melitensis from the Pleistocene of Sicily is considered an insular giant, whose body size is exceptionally large in comparison to that of any extant dormouse species. However, knowledge of the skull morphology of this giant glirid species is limited as cranial material is rare and mostly fragmentary. A fossil conglomerate representing a cave floor segment from Poggio Schinaldo, Sicily, presented an exceptional opportunity to reconstruct the cranium of Leithia melitensis. Following microCT scanning, five partial crania were digitally extracted from the conglomerate. A composite skull of the partial crania was then reconstructed with the use of merging and warping techniques, resulting in the best approximation to the complete skull morphology of this species thus far. All major structures except for the nasal bone are present in the composite model, indicating very robust morphology, especially in the zygomatic area and the pterygoid flange. This model could potentially be very important for our understanding of the morphology and ecology of this gigantic dormouse, as well as for providing valuable data for understanding the phenomenon of insular gigantism more generally.
6 citations
Related Topics (5)
Performance Metrics
| Year | Papers |
|---|---|
| 2020 | 2 |
| 2016 | 1 |
| 2015 | 1 |
| 2004 | 2 |
| 1992 | 1 |