3. Functional Morphology of the Postcranial Skeleton

The field of vertebrate functional morphology grew out of traditional comparative vertebrate morphology. By the 17th century, scientists were modeling the actions of muscles on the skeleton as simple levers, but this remained uncommon until the latter half of the 20th century with the introduction of the concepts of mechanical advantage and speed vs. power systems in limb morphology. Current studies in this field are largely unchanged from those of the late 1900s, the largest steps forward being in the ability to analyze large, multivariate datasets, and quantify complex shapes due to leaps in computing power, and in the development of methods to account for phylogenetic signal in morphological data. This chapter will describe the process of a functional morphological analysis of lever mechanics including: identification of dominant muscles and assessing the action of those muscles based on comparative anatomy, identification of in-levers and out-levers, measurement of lever arms, and statistical analysis.