FOCUS QUESTION: What are the similarities and differences in rodent or bird anatomy with human anatomy?
Groupmate: Shaya
Overview
This lab included a dissection where groups worked to excavate bones from a compressed owl pellet, and then work to identify which organism specific bones came from.
We were able to come to this conclusion with three pieces of physical evidence:
The humerus
The bone we excavated had a slight marking (a flap of bone jutting outwards) that was characteristic of the vole humerus bone.
The scapula
The pair of shoulder blades (scapula) we were able to find were characteristic of the vole's, once again, due to a flap of bone jutting out, and also to its broader shape, compared to the shrews' and moles'.
The skull
Using the skull key, we were able to determine that the skull was a vole's because of its characteristics of teeth with no gap (diastema) between front and back teeth, and also the fact that it had a cheekbone (zygomatic arch).
The skeleton of the vole had a fundamentally identical role as to that in humans, such as replenishing red blood cells, supporting the body, and protecting its soft internal organs. Some bones' shapes were also near identical, for example the vertebrae, which have a similar function in the vole anatomy. Another surprising similarity was the shape of specific bones, like the humerus we found, which was also a long bone in humans. However, the size of the bones, in general, varied drastically. They were basically a scaled-down version of the bones we have in our body, with a few minor surface changes, which was unexpected because of the size of osteoclasts, osteoblasts, and the fibers they made would not change, so I expected a different bone composition to make up for this drawback of just scaling down. Also, another big difference I noticed was the thinness of certain bones, like the scapula, because of the intense, quick movements that I have seen many rodents have, I was confused at the fragility of bones that helped soften the impact.
Thanks for reading
