Department of Biological Sciences, Sam Houston State University, Huntsville, Texas.
Cátedra Vertebrados, Facultad de Ciencias Naturales, Universidad Nacional de Tucumán, Instituto de Herpetología, Fundación Miguel Lillo, Tucumán, Argentina.
Anat Rec (Hoboken). 2020 May;303(5):1305-1326. doi: 10.1002/ar.24246. Epub 2019 Sep 13.
Squamates exhibit a vast diversity of body plans, which directly determines habitat use and preference. Here the skeleton of the sand-swimmer burrower gymnophthalmid, Calyptommatus leiolepis, is analyzed to investigate how its peculiar fossorial locomotion affects its osteology. Calyptommatus leiolepis is a limb-reduced, short-intermediate tailed lizard. Although there are other studies on its general anatomy, we performed a detailed description of its skeleton. Using high-resolution computer tomography, each bone element within the skeleton was digitally segmented and a detailed description rendered. Anatomical features related to burrowing include the head having a shovel-like snout with a well-developed horizontal soft tissue ridge, nasal cartilages that exclude sand from the nostrils, reduced eyes covered by a brille, lack of forelimbs, extreme reduction of hind limbs, and imbricated scales among others. The genus Calyptommatus has unique features such as a triradiate jugal (with digit-like posterior projections), a reduced pectoral girdle and forelimbs, parasternal processes that interconnect the ribs, and a single digit in the hind limbs. When comparing this species with other gymnophthalmid lizards including, fossorial species, it is clear that Calyptommatus exhibits the highest number of structural modifications within the family. Despite its specialized morphology, it still retains characters that link this genus to other members of Gymnophthalmidae when included in a phylogeny based solely on phenotypic data. Anat Rec, 303:1305-1326, 2020. © 2019 American Association for Anatomy.
有鳞目表现出广泛的身体形态多样性，这直接决定了其栖息地的利用和偏好。这里对沙泳穴居蜥蜴，Calyptommatus leiolepis 的骨骼进行分析，以研究其特殊的穴居运动如何影响其骨骼结构。Calyptommatus leiolepis 是一种肢体退化、短尾的蜥蜴。尽管已经有其他关于其一般解剖结构的研究，但我们对其骨骼进行了详细的描述。使用高分辨率计算机断层扫描，对骨骼中的每个骨骼元素进行数字分割并进行详细描述。与挖掘有关的解剖学特征包括头部具有铲状的口鼻部，并有发达的水平软组织脊，鼻软骨可防止沙子进入鼻孔，眼睛缩小且被眶前骨覆盖，没有前肢，后肢极度退化，鳞片相互交错等。Calyptommatus 属具有独特的特征，例如三辐射的颧骨（具有指状的后突），简化的肩带和前肢，肋间的胸骨突相互连接，以及后肢的单个趾骨。当将该物种与其他有鳞目蜥蜴（包括穴居物种）进行比较时，很明显，Calyptommatus 在该科中表现出最多的结构改变。尽管其形态特殊，但当仅基于表型数据构建系统发育树时，它仍然保留了将该属与 Gymnophthalmidae 其他成员联系起来的特征。解剖学记录，303:1305-1326, 2020. © 2019 美国解剖学会。
