PRIMATE ORIGINS: Adaptations and Evolution

✍ Scribed by M. S. Springer, W. J. Murphy, E. Eizirik, O. Madsen, M. Scally, C. J. Douady (auth.), Matthew J. Ravosa, Marian Dagosto (eds.)

• Publisher: Springer US
• Year: 2007
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 845
• Edition: 1
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This book updates, summarizes and synthesizes past and current research regarding the origin of the Order Primates. When did Primates arise? To what group of mammals are they most closely related? What is the functional and adaptive meaning of their constellation of derived characteristics? The papers in this volume examine hypotheses that have dominated our notions regarding early primate evolution and by coupling this with an emergent body of novel evidence due to new fossil discoveries and technological and methodological advances, provide a long overdue multidisciplinary reanalysis of the suite of derived life history, socioecological, neural, visual, circumorbital, locomotor, postural and masticatory specializations of the first primates. This integrative neontological and paleontological perspective is critical for understanding major behavioral and morphological transformations during the later evolution of higher primate clades. Primate Origins: Adaptations and Evolution is ideal for advanced undergraduates, graduate students and professionals in the fields of primatology, anthropology, mammalogy, and paleontology.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter....Pages i-xxx
A Molecular Classification for the Living Orders of Placental Mammals and the Phylogenetic Placement of Primates....Pages 1-28
New Light on the Dates of Primate Origins and Divergence....Pages 29-49
The Postcranial Morphology of Ptilocercus lowii (Scandentia, Tupaiidae) and its Implications for Primate Supraordinal Relationships....Pages 51-82
Primate Origins: A Reappraisal of Historical Data Favoring Tupaiid Affinities....Pages 83-142
Primate Taxonomy, Plesiadapiforms, and Approaches to Primate Origins....Pages 143-178
Jaw-Muscle Function and the Origin of Primates....Pages 179-231
Were Basal Primates Nocturnal? Evidence From Eye and Orbit Shape....Pages 233-256
Oculomotor Stability and the Functions of the Postorbital Bar and Septum....Pages 257-283
Primate Origins and the Function of the Circumorbital Region: What's Load Got to Do with It?....Pages 285-328
Origins of Grasping and Locomotor Adaptations in Primates: Comparative and Experimental Approaches Using an Opossum Model....Pages 329-380
Evolvability, Limb Morphology, and Primate Origins....Pages 381-401
Primate Gaits and Primate Origins....Pages 403-435
Morphological Correlates of Forelimb Protraction in Quadrupedal Primates....Pages 437-456
Ancestral Locomotor Modes, Placental Mammals, and the Origin of Euprimates: Lessons From History....Pages 457-487
The Postcranial Morphotype of Primates....Pages 489-534
New Skeletons of Paleocene-Eocene Plesiadapiformes: A Diversity of Arboreal Positional Behaviors in Early Primates....Pages 535-581
Start Small and Live Slow: Encephalization, Body Size, and Life History Strategies in Primate Origins and Evolution....Pages 583-623
Evolutionary Specializations of Primate Brain Systems....Pages 625-675
New Views on the Origin of Primate Social Organization....Pages 677-701
Primate Bioenergetics: An Evolutionary Perspective....Pages 703-737
Episodic Molecular Evolution of Some Protein Hormones in Primates and Its Implications for Primate Adaptation....Pages 739-773
Parallelisms Among Primates and Possums....Pages 775-803
Perspectives on Primate Color Vision....Pages 805-819
Back Matter....Pages 821-829

✦ Subjects

Anthropology; Paleontology; Zoology