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SOCIAL STRUCTURING. “Visual communication among conspecifics within Primates is part of maintaining social groups, social bonds, reproduction, and many aspects of daily life, especially so among the diurnal species. Primates generate visual communication signals in the face and these signals include skin coloration/patterning and facial expressions/displays.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joa.12440/full View in LinkedIn

FRAGMENT FROM NATURE continues from last weekend and concludes this weekend on the theme of the human face. This delightful article combines morphology, biochemistry, and evolutionary biology in this multidisciplinary enquiry into the human face. Seeing the familiar anew is always a challenge, but the rewards are manifold. That is a gift of reading from different disciplines by very bright authors, the core of a curated Natural Sciences journal club. Enjoy! View in LinkedIn

Amarilis at its best. View in LinkedIn

WISHFUL THINKING. “Copernicus...brought the sun to a standstill and launched the Earth into the skies -- heliocentrism replaces geocentrism.” https://lnkd.in/deri8XN View in LinkedIn

MUSCLES CONTRACT. “All skeletal muscle, including mimetic musculature, works by getting shorter, or contracting. Each muscle is made up of smaller units that work together to contract. Muscles consist of packaged units called ‘fascicles’, collections of muscle fibers enveloped by connective tissue. Each muscle fiber (or myofiber) in turn consists of bundles of myofibrils, which are made up of many filaments of contractile proteins. One of those contractile proteins is myosin.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joa.12440/full View in LinkedIn

GROUP SIZE. “These studies demonstrate that there is a strong co-evolution between social group size and neurobiological components of facial musculature, at least in the catarrhines. Overall, it appears that as group size increases, primate species have more brain area dedicated to the production of facial displays/expressions.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joa.12440/full View in LinkedIn

NEOCORTICAL IMPACT. “Dobson (2012) showed that neocortex size (the area of the brain that includes regions devoted to social interactions) is a significant predictor of facial nerve nuclei volumes in catarrhines (Old World monkeys and apes).” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joa.12440/full View in LinkedIn

STRUCTURAL UNDERPINNINGS. “Sherwood et al. (2005) found relatively greater volume of facial nerve nuclei in the great apes and humans than in all other Old World primates, suggesting increased differentiation of the facial muscles and greater utilization of the visual channel in social communication.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joa.12440/full View in LinkedIn

SOCIAL NOT PHYLOGENETIC. “Neurobiological evidence also indicates that there are considerable socioecological variables involved in the evolution of facial displays among primate species. species that live in large, complex social groups had more facial nerve neurons than species that live in small social groups, indicating more potential control over mimetic musculature.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joa.12440/full View in LinkedIn

NEW THINKING. “This ‘phylogenetic model’ of morphology has recently been challenged. Work in wide phylogenetic, ecological, and social environment ranges of primates (and some non-primate mammals) has shown that social environment variables play a considerable role in the adaptive morphology of mimetic musculature.” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/joa.12440/full View in LinkedIn