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Sphaeroptica: A tool for pseudo-3D visualization and 3D measurements on arthropods
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Natural history collections are invaluable reference collections. Digitizing these collections is a transformative process that improves the accessibility, preservation, and exploitation of specimens and associated data in the long term. Arthropods make up the majority of zoological collections. However, arthropods are small, have detailed color textures and share small, complex and shiny structures, which poses a challenge to conventional digitization methods. Sphaeroptica is a multi-images viewer that uses a sphere of oriented images. It allows the visualization of insects including their tiniest features, the positioning of landmarks, and the extraction of 3D coordinates for measuring linear distances or for use in geometric morphometrics analysis. The quantitative comparisons show that the measures obtained with Sphaeroptica are similar to the measurements derived from 3D μCT models with an average difference inferior to 1\%, while featuring the high resolution of color stacked pictures with all details like setae, chaetae, scales, and other small and/or complex structures. Shaeroptica was developed for the digitization of small arthropods but it can be used with any sphere of aligned images resulting from the digitization of objects or specimens with complex surface and shining, black, or translucent texture which cannot easily be digitized using structured light scanner or Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetry.
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RBINS Staff Publications 2024 OA
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Earliest perissodactyls reveal large-scale dispersals during the PETM
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Perissodactyls were a diverse order of mammals in the Northern Hemisphere during the Paleogene, but very few species remain today. They first appear during the Paleocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM; 56 Ma) on the three continents of the Northern Hemisphere. Because they lack modern diversity, the study of their evolutionary history remains difficult, relying almost exclusively on fossils. In addition, their origin and early diversification remain elusive since all main groups appear at the same time with several genera and are already diverse, contrary to other modern mammal orders. Here, we investigate the early evolution of perissodactyls by analyzing a new dataset focusing on early species to obtain a new expansive phylogeny. This new topology, in combination with new observations and comparisons demonstrates that several genera are synonymous, simplifying the evolutionary picture of early perissodactyls. We show that the number of genera was overestimated and should be significantly reevaluated. These results also highlight fast dispersals of two genera, Pliolophus and Cardiolophus, on the three Northern continents, reflecting that of other modern mammals. The phylogeny also supports a potential Indo-Pakistani origin of perissodactyls. In addition, this large-scale phylogeny shows that many species that were named as “Hyracotherium” in the past (or sometimes “Eohippus”, the “dawn-horse”) and considered as “horses”, are not actually closely related to horses (Hippomorpha), including Hyracotherium itself, but can be considered as basal perissodactyls.
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RBINS Staff Publications 2026 OA
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Disentangling impact ejecta dynamics using micro–X‐Ray Fluorescence (μ‐XRF): A case study from the terrestrial cretaceous‐Paleogene (K‐Pg) boundary.
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RBINS Staff Publications 2025
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Icaphoca choristodon n. gen., n. sp., a new monachine seal (Carnivora, Mammalia) from the Neogene of Peru
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Icaphoca choristodon n. gen., n. sp., described in the present study, represents the sixth monachine seal from the Neogene Pisco Formation of Peru. The species is solely known from the holotype, including a cranium with both mandibles, as well as five cervical vertebrae including the atlas and axis. This holotype was collected at the Cerro La Bruja locality, the type locality of Magophoca brevirostris, in the Ica Desert after which Icaphoca has been named. Stratigraphically, the holotype was recovered from strata underlying those of the Cerro La Bruja level (CLB level), from which Magophoca was recovered. These beds likely correspond with the P1-2 unit of the P1 sequence within the Pisco Formation. Assumed to be as old as 9 Ma (middle Tortonian), Icaphoca may be the oldest described monachine seal from the southeast Pacific. Following Magophoca and Noriphoca, Icaphoca is the third extinct monachine seal known to have six upper incisors. This plesiomorphic character is absent in all other extant and extinct Monachinae which have only four upper incisors. The elongation of the snout, as well as the presence of profound diastemas between the postcanine teeth, suggests that Icaphoca is closely related to Acrophoca from the upper Tortonian and Messinian of the Pisco Formation in the Sacaco area (Arequipa Department), c. 200 km southeast to Cerro La Bruja. The specific name choristodon refers to this spacing between the post-canine teeth. The close phylogenetic relationship between Icaphoca and Acrophoca is confirmed by the phylogenetic analysis, which retrieves both genera as sister taxa.
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RBINS Staff Publications 2025
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Towards an integrative revision of Haplotaxidae (Annelida: Clitellata)
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RBINS Staff Publications 2024
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Revision of a unique Australian leafhopper genus Stenopsoides Evans (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae: Idiocerinae: Macropsini)
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RBINS Staff Publications 2021
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Oceanographic and Marine Cross-Domain Data Management for Sustainable Development
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RBINS Staff Publications 2016
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Repositioning data management near data acquisition
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RBINS Staff Publications 2016
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Fifteen species in one: deciphering the Brachionus plicatilis species complex (Rotifera, Monogononta) through DNA taxonomy
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RBINS Staff Publications 2016
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The influence of environmental variables on freshwater rotifers of the family Brachionidae and Lecanidae in Thailand
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RBINS Staff Publications 2017