Gilles, L.

Gillet, A.

Ninane, C.

Parmentier, E.

Zaeytydt, E.

Open Marine Archive

	  	  
157	  
Poster code : ANA-PATH-8 
 
Ecomorpholgy of the vertebral column: preliminary study 
 
Gillet Amandine(1), Catherine Ninane(2), Esther Zaeytydt(3), Laurent Gilles(4), Eric Parmentier(5) 
 
(1) Laboratoire de Morphologie Fonctionnelle et Evolutive, Université de Liège, Allée de la Chimie, 3, Liege, 
Liege, 4000, Belgium. 
(2) Université de Liege. 
(3) Université de Liège. 
(4) Université de Liège. 
(5) Laboratoire de Morphologie Fonctionnelle et Evolutive, Institut de Chimie, Bâtiment B6c, 4000 Liège. 
 
Ecomorphology is the study of the relationships between functional design and the environment. One of its aims is to 
understand how the environmental factors can constraint the performance of an organism or act on its phenotype. Different 
studies have already showed in different cetaceans that the number and shape of vertebrae can reflect the stiffness of the 
body and consequently can impact their swimming mode. The aim of this preliminary study is to establish relationships 
between characteristics of the vertebral column of different cetaceans and their ecology. To this purpose, we have studied 
meristic and morphometric data on the vertebrae (centrum length, height and width, neural and haemal spine height and the 
transverse process length) in different species of mysticetes and odontocetes coming from the Aquarium-Museum of Liège 
and Royal Institute of Natural Sciences of Bruxelles. Preliminary results allowed the  distinction of two morphotypes. The 
first one comprises smaller species that are characterized by a high number of vertebral counts, short centra and an 
important regionalization of the backbone The second group contains larger species which possess less vertebral counts, 
longer centra and without a great column regionalization. These differences should be related to different swimming modes 
and reflect the different ecological behaviours of the studied cetaceans. 


Ecomorpholgy of the vertebral column: preliminary study

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