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Article Reference New or noteable records of brittle stars (Echinodermata: Ophiuroidea) from South Africa.
Ophiuroid research in South Africa has not kept pace with global taxonomic research with the last major taxonomic review of the group being published in 1976. This paper documents all new records of Ophiuroidea from South Africa since (and including) 1977. These records originate from specimens housed in five zoological collections, from photographic records and from reports published in the non-taxonomic literature. A short review of the history of ophiuroid taxonomy in South Africa is also given and for each new record, key references, distribution, ecology, additional notes and, where possible, photographs, are presented. This has resulted in an additional 24 species being recorded within the mainland Exclusive Economic Zone of South Africa, elevating the total known number of ophiuroid species reported in the region to 137.
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications
Inbook Reference De evolutie van evolutiedenken: van Aristotles tot de moderne synthese
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications
Article Reference Sex in the city: uncovering sex-specific management of equine resources from prehistoric times to the modern period in France
Sex identification from fragmentary archeozoological assemblages is particularly challenging in the Equid family, including for horses, donkeys and their hybrids. This limitation has precluded in-depth investigations of sex-ratio variation in various temporal, geographic and social contexts. Recently, shallow DNA sequencing has offered an economical solution to equine sex determination, even in environments where DNA preservation conditions is not optimal. In this study, we applied state-of-the-art methods in ancient DNA-based equine sex determination to 897 osseous remains in order to assess whether equal proportions of males and females could be found in a range of archeological contexts in France. We found Magdalenian horse hunt not focused on isolated bachelors, and Upper Paleolithic habitats and natural traps equally balancing sex ratios. In contrast, Iron Age sacrificial rituals appeared to have been preferentially oriented to male horses and this practice extended into the Roman Period. During Antiquity, the Middle Ages and the Modern Period, cities emerged as environments largely dominated by horse males. This strong sex-bias was considerably reduced, and sometimes even absent, in various rural contexts. Combined with previous archaeozoological work and textual evidence, our results portray an urban economy fueled by adult, often old, males, and rural environments where females and subadults of both sexes were maintained to sustain production demands.
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications 2022
Article Reference Historical management of equine resources in France from the Iron Age to the Modern Period
Alongside horses, donkeys and their first-generation hybrids represent members of the Equidae family known for their social, economic and symbolic importance in protohistoric and historical France. However, their relative importance and their respective roles in different regions and time periods are difficult to assess based on textual, iconographic and archaeological evidence. This is both due to incomplete, partial and scattered historical sources and difficulties to accurately assign fragmentary archaeological remains at the proper taxonomic level. DNA- based methods, however, allow for a robust identification of the taxonomic status of ancient equine osseous material from minimal sequence data. Here, we leveraged shallow ancient DNA sequencing and the dedicated Zonkey computational pipeline to obtain the first baseline distribution for horses, mules and donkeys in France from the Iron Age to the Modern period. Our collection includes a total of 873 ancient specimens spanning 128 ubiquitous and the most dominant species identified, our dataset reveals the importance of mule breeding during Roman times, especially between the 1st and 3rd centuries CE (Common Era), where they represented between 20.0% and 34.2% of equine assemblages. In contrast, donkeys were almost absent from northern France as-semblages during the whole Roman period, but replaced mules in rural and urban commercial and economic centers from the early Middle Ages. Our work also identified donkeys of exceptional size during Late Antiquity, which calls for a deep reassessment of the true morphological space of past equine species. This study confirmed the general preference toward horses throughout all time periods investigated but revealed dynamic manage-ment strategies leveraging the whole breadth of equine resources in various social, geographic and temporal contexts.
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications 2021
Article Reference Observations on the reproductive biology of Laurentophryne parkeri (Laurent, 1950) based on the holotype
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications 2017
Article Reference A case of predation by Naja samarensis (Elapidae) on Cyclocorus nuchalis nuchalis (Lamprophiidae) on Mindanao Island, Philippines
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications 2020
Article Reference Toxicodryas vexator Greenbaum, Allen, Vaughan, Pauwels, Wallach, Kusamba, Muninga, Mwenebatu, Mali, Badjedjea, Penner, Rödel, Rivera, Sterkhova, Johnson, Tapondjou and Brown, 2021. Eastern Black-and-Yellow Tree Snake. Diet.
We report a case of predation by an adult Eastern Black-and-Yellow Tree Snake Toxicodryas vexator (Serpentes : Colubridae) on a juvenile Lord Derby's Scaly-tailed Squirrel Anomalurus derbianus (Rodentia : Anomaluridae) in Yangambi, Tshopo Province, Democratic Republic of the Congo. This is the first documented interaction between these two species.
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications 2022
Article Reference Results of the Rumphius Biohistorical Expedition to Ambon (1990). Part 18. The Rissoinidae and Zebinidae (Gastropoda: Caenogastropoda)
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications 2021
Article Reference Revision of a unique Australian leafhopper genus Stenopsoides Evans (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae: Idiocerinae: Macropsini)
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications 2021
Article Reference Skeleton of a new owl from the early Eocene of North America (Aves, Strigiformes) with an accipitrid-like foot morphology
We describe a partial skeleton of a large-sized owl from Wasatchian strata of the Willwood Formation (Wyoming, U.S.A.). The holotype of Primoptynx poliotauros, gen. et sp. nov., includes all major postcranial bones and is one of the most substantial Paleogene records of the Strigiformes. The fossil shows that owls exhibited a considerable morphological diversity in the early Eocene of North America and occupied disparate ecological niches. As in the protostrigid taxon Minerva from the late early to early middle Eocene of North America, but unlike in extant owls, the ungual phalanges of the hallux and the second toe of the new species are distinctly larger than those of the other toes. Primoptynx poliotauros gen. et sp. nov., however, does not exhibit the derived tibiotarsus morphology of the Protostrigidae. Even though the new species may well be a stem group representative of protostrigid owls, current data do not allow an unambiguous phylogenetic placement. Concerning the size of the ungual phalanges, the feet of P. poliotauros correspond to those of extant hawks and allies (Accipitridae). We therefore hypothesize that it used its feet to dispatch prey items in a hawk-like manner, whereas extant owls kill prey with their beak. Primoptynx and protostrigid owls were possibly specialized in foraging on prey items that required an accipitrid-like killing strategy, such as larger-sized or more defensive mammals. The extinction of these peculiar owls may have been related to the radiation of accipitrid diurnal birds of prey, which appear to have diversified in the late Eocene and early Oligocene.
Located in Library / RBINS Staff Publications 2020