Department of Anatomy, Midwestern University, Downers Grove, Illinois 60515, USA.
Anat Rec (Hoboken). 2010 Mar;293(3):388-401. doi: 10.1002/ar.21076.
Rungwecebus kipunji is a recently discovered, critically endangered primate endemic to southern Tanzania. Although phenetically similar to mangabeys, molecular analyses suggest it is more closely related to Papio or possibly descended from an ancient population of baboon-mangabey hybrids. At present, only a single kipunji specimen, an M1-stage juvenile male, is available for study; thus, the cranial morphology of the adult kipunji is unknown. In this study, we used developmental simulation to estimate the adult kipunji's 3D cranial morphology. We examined variation in cercopithecine developmental vectors, applied selected vectors to the juvenile cranium, and compared the resulting simulated adults to actual adult male papionins. Differences between papionin developmental vectors were small and statistically insignificant. This uniformity suggests conservation of an ancestral papionin developmental program. Simulated kipunji adults were likewise extremely similar. As a group, the simulated adults were morphometrically distinct from other papionins, corroborating the kipunji's generic status. Simulated adults were phenetically most similar to Lophocebus aterrimus but were distinguished from all adult papionins by the same unique traits that characterize the kipunji juvenile: a tall neurocranium, broad face, short nasal bones, concave anteorbital profile, and dorsally rotated palate. This concordance between juvenile and estimated-adult morphologies confirms that papionin cranial shape is largely established before M1 eruption. The estimated kipunji adult's neurocranium strongly resembles that of Papio, providing the first cranial evidence supporting their phylogenetic relationship. If the kipunji does indeed have a hybrid origin, then its phenetic affinity to L. aterrimus favors Lophocebus as the proto-kipunji's paternal lineage.
鲁文佐里疣猴是一种最近才被发现的、极度濒危的灵长类动物，仅分布在坦桑尼亚南部。虽然在表型上与山魈相似，但分子分析表明，它与狒狒的亲缘关系更为密切，或者可能是由古代狒狒-山魈杂交种群衍生而来。目前，仅有一只金巴利标本，即一个 M1 阶段的幼年雄性，可供研究；因此，成年金巴利的颅骨形态尚不清楚。在这项研究中，我们使用发育模拟来估计成年金巴利的 3D 颅骨形态。我们研究了食果猴类的发育向量的变化，将选定的向量应用于幼年颅骨，并将模拟的成年个体与实际的雄性狒狒进行了比较。狒狒类发育向量之间的差异很小，且无统计学意义。这种一致性表明，祖先狒狒的发育程序得到了保守。模拟的金巴利成年个体也非常相似。作为一个群体，模拟的成年个体在形态上与其他狒狒明显不同，这证实了金巴利的属地位。模拟的成年个体在表型上与 Lophocebus aterrimus 最为相似，但与所有成年狒狒都有区别，其特征是与金巴利幼年个体相同的独特特征：高颅腔、宽脸、短鼻骨、凹形眶前轮廓和背侧旋转的腭。幼年和估计成年形态之间的这种一致性证实了狒狒颅骨形状在 M1 爆发之前就已经基本形成。估计的金巴利成年个体的颅腔强烈类似于狒狒，为它们的系统发育关系提供了第一个颅骨证据。如果金巴利确实有杂交起源，那么它与 L. aterrimus 的表型亲和力有利于将 Lophocebus 作为其原始谱系。
