“Exploring the detailed muscular anatomy of very small mammals is difficult to do using dissection alone since often the details are damaged before they can be observed properly. Here, we used diceCT to learn more about the musculature associated with the bat calcar — a skeletal novelty found in bat feet. DiceCT combined with standard histology revealed anatomical variation among the calcar musculature of different bat species that quite possibly has functional implications. This could mean that the calcar has functionally diversified among bats. DiceCT is an extremely useful tool for revealing previously-unknown anatomical diversity, especially in small animals.”
Lead author, Kathryn Stanchak (@)
See more of this research at the Bat Cave on Twitter, the Santana Lab website, and read the the pub at The Anatomical Record!
DiceCT 