COMPUTATIONAL BIOMECHANICS IN FOSSIL AND LIVING AMPHIBIANS AND REPTILES
The study of biomechanics of actual reptiles and amphibian is directly linked with the study of extinct Temnospondyli, which is a diverse subclass of small to giant tetrapods that flourished worldwide during the Carboniferous, Permian, and Triassic periods. The use of virtual tools from engineering allowed us to elucidate dietary behaviours of taxa that nowadays is extinct.
Massive biomechanical plane models were used to study the evolution of the morphology of the skull in capitosaurs in Fortuny et al. (2012) showing a trend to improve the biomechanical capabilities. In addition, the different ecomorphotypes of Temnsopondyls in Fortuny et al. (2011) showed how they diversified in order to reach food for every species occupying the terrestrial environment. Three-dimensional FEA models of several amphibians and reptiles such as the living Andrias davidianus, Dicamptodon ensatus or Alligator mississipiensis or the extinct Edingerella madagascariensis and Stanocephalosaurus birdi among others to study its biomechanical behaviour. In Fortuny et al. (2015), Fortuny et al. (2016) and Fortuny et al. (2017). All these works depicted that the extinct group had peculiar paleoecological niches with proper bites and stress patterns very different from those of giant salamanders and crocodiles, and this could be related to their extinction. And finally, Zhou et al. (2017) studied the ossification sequence in salamanders’ skulls reveal that bone loss may be originated due to biomechanical optimization and potential reduction of developmental costs.
Massive biomechanical plane models were used to study the evolution of the morphology of the skull in capitosaurs in Fortuny et al. (2012) showing a trend to improve the biomechanical capabilities. In addition, the different ecomorphotypes of Temnsopondyls in Fortuny et al. (2011) showed how they diversified in order to reach food for every species occupying the terrestrial environment. Three-dimensional FEA models of several amphibians and reptiles such as the living Andrias davidianus, Dicamptodon ensatus or Alligator mississipiensis or the extinct Edingerella madagascariensis and Stanocephalosaurus birdi among others to study its biomechanical behaviour. In Fortuny et al. (2015), Fortuny et al. (2016) and Fortuny et al. (2017). All these works depicted that the extinct group had peculiar paleoecological niches with proper bites and stress patterns very different from those of giant salamanders and crocodiles, and this could be related to their extinction. And finally, Zhou et al. (2017) studied the ossification sequence in salamanders’ skulls reveal that bone loss may be originated due to biomechanical optimization and potential reduction of developmental costs.
One of the novelties developed by me and my colleagues in this research line was the comparison with fossil taxa. Modelling of fossil taxa invariably involves assumptions as a result of preservation-induced loss of information in the fossil record. To test the validity of predictions from FEA, given such assumptions, we compared these results to independent lines of evidence for cranial mechanics as bone microstructure or sutures. In anatomy, a suture is a fairly rigid joint between two or more hard elements of an organism, with or without significant overlap of the elements. And, microstructure can be studied by means of the histology, the branch of biology which studies the tissues of animals and plants using microscopy and compared with FEA models (Konietzko-Meier et al. (2018) and Gruntmejer et al (2019)).
All these works were done and are done in joint research with researchers from the Institut Català de Paleontologia (Spain), the Muséum National d´Histoire Nautrell Paris (France), Uniwersytet Opolski (Poland), Guilin University of Electronic Technology (China) and Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena (Germany).
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
- Konietzko-Meier, D., Gruntmejer, K., Marcé-Nogué, J., Bodzioch, A., & Fortuny, J. (2018). Merging cranial histology and 3D-computational biomechanics: a review of the feeding ecology of a Late Triassic temnospondyl amphibian. PeerJ, 6, e4426. (url).
- Zhou, Z., Fortuny, J., Marcé-Nogué, J., & Skutschas, P. P. (2017). Cranial biomechanics in basal urodeles: the Siberian salamander (Salamandrella keyserlingii) and its evolutionary and developmental implications. Scientific Reports, 7(1), 10174. (url)
- Fortuny, J., Marcé-Nogué, J., & Konietzko-Meier, D. (2017). Feeding biomechanics of Late Triassic metoposaurids (Amphibia: Temnospondyli): a 3D finite element analysis approach. Journal of Anatomy, 230(6), 752–765. (url)
- Fortuny J., Marcé-Nogué J., Steyer J-S., De Esteban-Trivigno S., Mujal E., Gil L. (2016). Comparative 3D analyses and palaeoecology of giant early amphibians (Temnospondyli: Stereospondyli). Scientific Reports. 6: 30387. (url)