Approximately two decades after the first pioneering analyses, the study of shape asymmetry
with the methods of geometric morphometrics has matured and is a burgeoning field. New …

Fluctuating asymmetry consists of random deviations from perfect symmetry in populations
of organisms. It is a measure of developmental noise, which reflects a population's average …

The central insight of Darwin's Origin of Species is that evolution is an ecological
phenomenon, arising from the activities of organisms in the'struggle for life'. By contrast, the …

The first edition of Geometric Morphometrics for Biologists has been the primary resource for
teaching modern geometric methods of shape analysis to biologists who have a stronger …

Phenotypic integration is a pervasive characteristic of organisms. Numerous analyses have
demonstrated that patterns of phenotypic integration are conserved across large clades, but …

Abstract “Wolff's law” is a concept that has sometimes been misrepresented, and frequently
misunderstood, in the anthropological literature. Although it was originally formulated in a …

The duality of the skeleton as both a biological and cultural entity has formed the theoretical
basis of bioarchaeology. In recent years bioarchaeological studies have stretched the early …

Humans demonstrate species-wide bilateral asymmetry in long bone dimensions. Previous
studies have documented greater right-biases in upper limb bone dimensions—especially in …

Robustness is the invariance of phenotypes in the face of perturbation. The robustness of
phenotypes appears at various levels of biological organization, including gene expression …

Organisms represent a complex arrangement of anatomical structures and individuated
parts that must maintain functional associations through development. This integration of …