The Vertebrata is one of the most speciose groups of animals, comprising more than 58,000 living species. This book provides a detailed account on the comparative anatomy, development, homologies and evolution of the head, neck, pectoral and forelimb muscles of vertebrates. It includes hundreds of illustrations, as well as numerous tables showing the homologies between the muscles of all the major extant vertebrate taxa, including lampreys, elasmobranchs, hagfish, coelacanths, dipnoans, actinistians, teleosts, halecomorphs, ginglymodians, chondrosteans, caecilians, anurans, urodeles, turtles, lepidosaurs, crocodylians, birds, and mammals such as monotremes, rodents, tree-shrews, flying lemurs and primates, including modern humans. It also provides a list of more than a thousand synonyms that have been used by other authors to designate these muscles in the literature. Importantly, it also reviews data obtained in the fields of evolutionary developmental biology, molecular biology and embryology, and explains how this data helps to understand the evolution and homologies of vertebrate muscles. The book will useful to students, teachers, and researchers working in fields such as functional morphology, ecomorphology, evolutionary developmental biology, zoology, molecular biology, evolution, and phylogeny. As the book includes crucial information about the anatomy, development, homologies, evolution and muscular abnormalities of our own species, Homo sapiens, it will also be helpful to physicians and medical students.

An account of the different morphologies of vertebrate respiratory organs and structures. It explains the essence of different functional designs and strategies that have adaptively developed for the acquisition of molecular oxygen and elimination of carbon dioxide. The origins of the various respiratory systems are presented and debated from evolutionary, phylogenetic, behavioural and ecological perspectives. The book carefully outlines the interactions between the environment (the physical realm) and evolution and adaptation (the biological domain) that have set the composition and patterning of extant animal life.

The different aspects of muscle development are considered from cellular, molecular and genetic viewpoints, and the text is supported by black/white and color illustrations. The book will appeal to those studying muscle development and muscle biology in any organism.

Chordates comprise lampreys, hagfishes, jawed fishes, and tetrapods, plus a variety of more unfamiliar and crucially important non-vertebrate animal lineages, such as lancelets and sea squirts. This will be the first book to synthesize, summarize, and provide high-quality illustrations to show what is known of the configuration, development, homology, and evolution of the muscles of all major extant chordate groups. Muscles as different as those used to open the siphons of sea squirts and for human facial communication will be compared, and their evolutionary links will be explained. Another unique feature of the book is that it covers, illustrates, and provides detailed evolutionary tables for each and every muscle of the head, neck and of all paired and median appendages of extant vertebrates. Key Selling Features: Has more than 200 high-quality anatomical illustrations, including evolutionary trees that summarize the origin and evolution of all major muscle groups of chordates Includes data on the muscles of the head and neck and on the pectoral, pelvic, anal, dorsal, and caudal appendages of all extant vertebrate taxa Examines experimental observations from evolutionary developmental biology studies of chordate muscle development, allowing to evolutionarily link the muscles of vertebrates with those of other chordates Discusses broader developmental and evolutionary issues and their implications for macroevolution, such as the links between phylogeny and ontogeny, homology and serial homology, normal and abnormal development, the evolution, variations, and birth defects of humans, and medicine.

The development of vertebrate muscle has long been a major area of research in developmental biology. During the last decade, novel technical approaches have allowed us to unravel to a large extent the mechanisms underlying muscle formation, and myogenesis has become one of the best-understood paradigms for cellular differentiation. This book concisely summarizes our current knowledge about muscle development in vertebrates, from the determination of muscle precursors to terminal differentiation. Each chapter has been written by an expert in the field, and particular emphasis has been placed on the different developmental and molecular pathways followed by the three types of vertebrate musculature - skeletal, heart and smooth muscle.

This book challenges the assumption that morphological data are inherently unsuitable for phylogeny reconstruction, argues that both molecular and morphological phylogenies should play a major role in systematics, and provides the most comprehensive review of the comparative anatomy, homologies and evolution of the head, neck, pectoral and upper li