Origin, Development, and Evolution of Primate Muscles, with Notes on Human Anatomical Variations and Anomalies

Diogo, Rui; Wood, Bernard

doi:10.1002/9781118524756.ch8

Cited by 11 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 95 publications

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“…That is, it supports the view that development is so constrained that both in ‘normal’ and abnormal development one sees certain outcomes being produced again and again because ontogenetic constraints only allow a few possible outcomes, thus also leading to cases where the anatomical defects of some organisms are similar to the ‘normal’ phenotype of other organisms. The examination of the fetus studied by us further reinforces this view, because some of the defects can for instance be due to developmental delay/arrest, a pattern seen frequently in cases of human congenital malformations (Diogo & Wood, , , ; Diogo et al. ; Smith et al.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 60%

A detailed musculoskeletal study of a fetus with anencephaly and spina bifida (craniorachischisis), and comparison with other cases of human congenital malformations

et al. 2017

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Few descriptions of the musculoskeletal system of humans with anencephaly or spina bifida exist in the literature. Even less is published about individuals in which both phenomena occur together, i.e. about craniorachischisis. Here we provide a detailed report on the musculoskeletal structures of a fetus with craniorachischisis, as well as comparisons with the few descriptions for anencephaly and with musculoskeletal anomalies found in other congenital malformations. We focused in particular on the comparison with trisomies 13, 18, and 21 because neural tube defects have been associated with such chromosomal defects. Our results showed that many of the defects found in the fetus with craniorachischisis are similar not only to anomalies previously described in the available works on musculoskeletal phenotypes seen in fetuses with anencephaly and spina bifida, but also to a wide range of other different conditions/syndromes including trisomies 13, 18 and 21, and cyclopia. The fact that similar anomalies are seen commonly not only in a wide range of different syndromes, but also as variants of the normal human population and as the 'normal' phenotype of other animals, supports Pere Alberch's unfortunately named idea of a 'logic of monsters'. That is, it supports the idea that development is so constrained that both in 'normal' and abnormal development one sees certain outcomes being produced again and again because ontogenetic constraints only allow a few possible outcomes, thus also leading to cases where the anatomical defects of some organisms are similar to the 'normal' phenotype of other organisms. In fact, this applies not only to specific anomalies but also to general patterns, such as the fact that in pathological conditions affecting different regions of the body, one consistently sees more defects on the upper limbs than on the lower limbs. Such general patterns are, again, seen in the fetus examined for this study, which had 29 muscle anomalies on the right upper limb and 22 muscle anomalies on the left upper limb, vs. seven muscle anomalies on the right lower limb and two on the left lower limb. It is therefore hoped that this work, which is part of our effort to describe and compile information on human musculoskeletal defects found in a wide range of conditions, will contribute not only to a better understanding of craniorachischisis in particular and of human congenital malformations in general, but also to broader discussions on the fields of comparative anatomy, and developmental and evolutionary biology.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 60%

A detailed musculoskeletal study of a fetus with anencephaly and spina bifida (craniorachischisis), and comparison with other cases of human congenital malformations

et al. 2017

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“…This issue was recently reviewed by Diogo et al. (), Diogo (), and Diogo et al. (), who defined evolutionary developmental pathology and anthropology (evo‐devo‐P'Anth).…”

Section: Human Pathology and Development As Case Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…, , )—evo‐devo‐P'Anth in addition also pays a special attention to data obtained from biological and physical anthropology. For instance, it pays attention to information on the specific evolutionary changes, including convergences, parallelisms, and reversions of the muscles in each major extant primate group, and to the evolutionary rates within these transformations (e.g., Diogo and Wood, ; Diogo and Wood, ; Diogo and Wood, ; Diogo and Wood, ; Diogo and Molnar, ; Diogo and Wood, ).…”

Section: Human Pathology and Development As Case Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dinosaurs, Chameleons, Humans, and Evo‐Devo Path: Linking Étienne Geoffroy's Teratology, Waddington's Homeorhesis, Alberch's Logic of “Monsters,” and Goldschmidt Hopeful “Monsters”

2016

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Since the rise of evo-devo (evolutionary developmental biology) in the 1980s, few authors have attempted to combine the increasing knowledge obtained from the study of model organisms and human medicine with data from comparative anatomy and evolutionary biology in order to investigate the links between development, pathology, and macroevolution. Fortunately, this situation is slowly changing, with a renewed interest in evolutionary developmental pathology (evo-devo-path) in the past decades, as evidenced by the idea to publish this special, and very timely, issue on "Developmental Evolution in Biomedical Research." As all of us have recently been involved, independently, in works related in some way or another with evolution and developmental anomalies, we decided to join our different perspectives and backgrounds in the present contribution for this special issue. Specifically, we provide a brief historical account on the study of the links between evolution, development, and pathologies, followed by a review of the recent work done by each of us, and then by a general discussion on the broader developmental and macroevolutionary implications of our studies and works recently done by other authors. Our primary aims are to highlight the strength of studying developmental anomalies within an evolutionary framework to understand morphological diversity and disease by connecting the recent work done by us and others with the research done and broader ideas proposed by authors such as Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, Waddington, Goldschmidt, Gould, and Per Alberch, among many others to pave the way for further and much needed work regarding abnormal development and macroevolution.

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“…It is remarkable that, for a millennium (before Vesalius: see below), few authors recognized this fact. Whereas the anatomy of this monkey species is roughly similar to that of humans, there are still numerous specific anatomical differences between them, principally concerning soft tissues such as muscles (reviewed in Diogo & Wood, ).…”

Section: From the First Detailed Anatomical Description Of Nonhuman Pmentioning

confidence: 99%

Links between the discovery of primates and anatomical comparisons with humans, the chain of being, our place in nature, and racism

Diogo

2017

Journal of Morphology

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I focus on the crucial links between the discovery of nonhuman primates by Westerners, discussions on our place in nature, the chain of being, racism, and the history of primate comparative anatomy and of so-called "anatomical human racial studies." Strikingly, for more than a millennium humans knew more about the internal anatomy of a single monkey species than about that of their own bodies. This is because Galen used monkeys to infer human anatomy, in line with the human-animal continuity implied by the Greek notion of scala naturae. With the rise of Christianity, nonhuman primates were increasingly seen in a negative way. A more positive view emerged in the 14th century when nonhuman primates were directly studied/seen by Europeans, culminating in Tyson's 1699 work showing that chimps share more gross anatomical similarities with humans than with monkeys. However, the discomfort caused by this human-chimp similarity then led to a new idea of animal-human discontinuity, now related not to anatomy but to "civilization": between Europeans vs. non-Europeans + other primates. Moreover, Linnaeus' Systema Naturae and the emergence of "anatomical racial studies" influenced by Camper's craniology then led to even more extreme ideas, such as the notion that Europeans were both mentally and morphologically "ideal." Unfortunately the biased and often incorrect "results" of such studies, combined with ideas based on Darwin's "struggle for survival", became crucial in propaganda that lead to the rise of eugenics in the end of the 19th/first half of 20th centuries and that culminated in Nazism. Since the 1950s there has been an emphasis on the continuity/unity between all human groups and other primates, in great part influenced by what happened during World War 2. Reviews such as this one are, therefore, particularly necessary to illuminate and guard against attitudes against "the Other" and racist ideologies that are re-emerging in modern political discourse across the globe.

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Origin, Development, and Evolution of Primate Muscles, with Notes on Human Anatomical Variations and Anomalies

Cited by 11 publications

References 95 publications

A detailed musculoskeletal study of a fetus with anencephaly and spina bifida (craniorachischisis), and comparison with other cases of human congenital malformations

A detailed musculoskeletal study of a fetus with anencephaly and spina bifida (craniorachischisis), and comparison with other cases of human congenital malformations

Dinosaurs, Chameleons, Humans, and Evo‐Devo Path: Linking Étienne Geoffroy's Teratology, Waddington's Homeorhesis, Alberch's Logic of “Monsters,” and Goldschmidt Hopeful “Monsters”

Links between the discovery of primates and anatomical comparisons with humans, the chain of being, our place in nature, and racism

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