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Embryonic development and perinatal skeleton in a limbless, viviparous lizard, Anguis fragilis (Squamata: Anguimorpha)

Despite the long history of embryological studies of squamates, many groups of this huge clade have received only limited attention. One such understudied group is the anguimorphs, a clade comprising morphologically and ecologically very diverse lizards. We describe several stages of embryonic devel...

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Autores principales: Skawiński, Tomasz, Skórzewski, Grzegorz, Borczyk, Bartosz
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: PeerJ Inc. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8214852/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34178475
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.11621
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author Skawiński, Tomasz
Skórzewski, Grzegorz
Borczyk, Bartosz
author_facet Skawiński, Tomasz
Skórzewski, Grzegorz
Borczyk, Bartosz
author_sort Skawiński, Tomasz
collection PubMed
description Despite the long history of embryological studies of squamates, many groups of this huge clade have received only limited attention. One such understudied group is the anguimorphs, a clade comprising morphologically and ecologically very diverse lizards. We describe several stages of embryonic development of Anguis fragilis, a limbless, viviparous anguimorph. Interestingly, in several clutches we observe high morphological variation in characters traditionally important in classifying embryos into developmental stages. The causes of this variation remain unknown but environmental factors do not seem to be very important. Additionally, we describe the state of ossification in several perinatal specimens of A. fragilis. The cranial skeleton is relatively poorly ossified around the time of birth, with all of the bones constituting the braincase unfused. On the other hand, the vertebral column is well ossified, with the neurocentral sutures closed and the neural arches fused in all postatlantal vertebrae. Such an advanced state of ossification may be related to the greater importance of the vertebral column in locomotion in limbless species than in ones with fully-developed limbs. Numerous factors seem to affect the state of ossification at the time of hatching or birth in squamates, including phylogenetic position, mode of reproduction and, potentially, limblessness. However, data from a greater number of species are needed to reach firmer conclusions about the relative importance of these variables in certain clades.
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spelling pubmed-82148522021-06-25 Embryonic development and perinatal skeleton in a limbless, viviparous lizard, Anguis fragilis (Squamata: Anguimorpha) Skawiński, Tomasz Skórzewski, Grzegorz Borczyk, Bartosz PeerJ Developmental Biology Despite the long history of embryological studies of squamates, many groups of this huge clade have received only limited attention. One such understudied group is the anguimorphs, a clade comprising morphologically and ecologically very diverse lizards. We describe several stages of embryonic development of Anguis fragilis, a limbless, viviparous anguimorph. Interestingly, in several clutches we observe high morphological variation in characters traditionally important in classifying embryos into developmental stages. The causes of this variation remain unknown but environmental factors do not seem to be very important. Additionally, we describe the state of ossification in several perinatal specimens of A. fragilis. The cranial skeleton is relatively poorly ossified around the time of birth, with all of the bones constituting the braincase unfused. On the other hand, the vertebral column is well ossified, with the neurocentral sutures closed and the neural arches fused in all postatlantal vertebrae. Such an advanced state of ossification may be related to the greater importance of the vertebral column in locomotion in limbless species than in ones with fully-developed limbs. Numerous factors seem to affect the state of ossification at the time of hatching or birth in squamates, including phylogenetic position, mode of reproduction and, potentially, limblessness. However, data from a greater number of species are needed to reach firmer conclusions about the relative importance of these variables in certain clades. PeerJ Inc. 2021-06-17 /pmc/articles/PMC8214852/ /pubmed/34178475 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.11621 Text en ©2021 Skawiński et al. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
spellingShingle Developmental Biology
Skawiński, Tomasz
Skórzewski, Grzegorz
Borczyk, Bartosz
Embryonic development and perinatal skeleton in a limbless, viviparous lizard, Anguis fragilis (Squamata: Anguimorpha)
title Embryonic development and perinatal skeleton in a limbless, viviparous lizard, Anguis fragilis (Squamata: Anguimorpha)
title_full Embryonic development and perinatal skeleton in a limbless, viviparous lizard, Anguis fragilis (Squamata: Anguimorpha)
title_fullStr Embryonic development and perinatal skeleton in a limbless, viviparous lizard, Anguis fragilis (Squamata: Anguimorpha)
title_full_unstemmed Embryonic development and perinatal skeleton in a limbless, viviparous lizard, Anguis fragilis (Squamata: Anguimorpha)
title_short Embryonic development and perinatal skeleton in a limbless, viviparous lizard, Anguis fragilis (Squamata: Anguimorpha)
title_sort embryonic development and perinatal skeleton in a limbless, viviparous lizard, anguis fragilis (squamata: anguimorpha)
topic Developmental Biology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8214852/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34178475
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.11621
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