The vertebrate water-to-land transition and the rise of tetrapods brought about fundamental
changes for the groups undergoing these evolutionary changes (ie stem and early …

Chewing is widespread across vertebrates, including mammals, lepidosaurs, and ray-finned
and cartilaginous fishes, yet common wisdom about one group—amphibians—is that they …

Complex prey processing requires the repositioning of food between the teeth, as
modulated by a soft tissue appendage like a tongue or lips. In this study, we trace the …

Intra-oral food processing, including chewing, is important for safe swallowing and efficient
nutrient assimilation across tetrapods. Gape cycles in tetrapod chewing consist of four …

The tradeoff between force and velocity in skeletal muscle is a fundamental constraint on
vertebrate musculoskeletal design (form: function relationships). Understanding how and …

How animals process and absorb nutrients from their food is a fundamental question in
biology. Despite the continuity and interaction between intraoral food processing and post …

When hunting at sea, pinnipeds should adapt their foraging behaviors to suit the prey they
are targeting. We performed captive feeding trials with two species of otariid seal, Australian …

The cellulose-rich walls that protect plant cells are difficult to digest, and therefore
mechanical food processing is a key aspect of herbivory across vertebrates. Cell walls are …

Marker tracking is a major bottleneck in studies involving X-ray reconstruction of moving
morphology (XROMM). Here, we tested whether DeepLabCut, a new deep learning …

Comparative analyses of locomotion in tetrapods reveal two patterns of stride cycle
variability. Tachymetabolic tetrapods (birds and mammals) have lower inter-cycle variation …