Three-dimensional geometric morphometric analysis of the skull of Protoceratops andrewsi supports a socio-sexual signalling role for the ceratopsian frill.

ABSTRACT: Socio-sexual selection is predicted to be an important driver of evolution, influencing speciation, extinction and adaptation. The fossil record provides a means of testing these predictions, but detecting its signature from morphological data alone is difficult. There are, nonetheless, some specific patterns of growth and variation which are expected of traits under socio-sexual selection. The distinctive parietal-squamosal frill of ceratopsian dinosaurs has previously been suggested as a socio-sexual display trait, but evidence for this has been limited. Here, we perform a whole-skull shape analysis of an unprecedentedly large sample of specimens of Protoceratops andrewsi using a high-density landmark-based geometric morphometric approach to test four predictions regarding a poten

SUBMITTER: Knapp A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7893235 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature