Landmark Analysis of Musteloid Carnassials Applied to Taxonomic Identification and Examination of Sexual Dimorphism and Regional Morphotypes

<p>Guy Wilson Cave (GWC) in Sullivan County, Tennessee holds many late Pleistocene mammal fossils. Based on visual morphology, several partial mandibles with lower carnassial from GWC appeared to be musteloids. Geometric morphometrics has been successfully used to identify fragmentary fossils, so a landmark based, 2 dimensional technique was applied to identify the GWC musteloids using the lower carnassial. Digital images of several GWC fossils and of extant reference musteloids were combined using morphometric programs tpsDIG1, tpsUtil, and tpsSuper. Statistical data analysis was performed in PASW Statistics. Results successfully separated <i>Mephitis mephitis</i> (striped skunk) from <i>M. macroura</i> (hooded skunk) and <i>Martes americana</i> (American marten) from <i>M. pennanti</i> (fisher). Sex-based and geographical patterns were also found in the data. Sex separated all three species via the lower carnassial. Geographic divisions were found for <i>Mephitis mephitis</i>, <i>Martes americana</i> and <i>M. pennanti</i> populations that hint at interestingly unique biogeographical histories for each taxon.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

MS (Master of Science)

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis - unrestricted

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Geosciences

Year dc:date.issued

2012

Author dc:creator

• Christine, Joel Alvin

• Pleistocene
• Carnassial
• Landmark Analysis
• Guy Wilson Cave
• Musteloids
• Earth Sciences
• Paleontology
• Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright by the authors.

Repository record dc:identifier

https://dc.etsu.edu/etd/1452

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dc.etsu.edu:etd-2645