Variation in brain anatomy in frogs and its possible bearing on their locomotor ecology

MANZANO A; ANTHONY HERREL; ANNE-CLAIRE FABRE; ABDALA VIRGINIA

JOURNAL OF ANATOMY

WILEY-BLACKWELL PUBLISHING, INC

Lugar: Londres; Año: 2017 vol. 231 p. 38 - 58

0021-8782

Despite the long-standing interest in the evolution of the brain, relatively little is known about variation in brain anatomy in frogs. Yet, frogs are ecologically diverse and, as such, variation in brain anatomy linked todifferences in lifestyle or locomotor behavior can be expected. Here we present a comparative morphological study focusing on the macro- and micro-anatomy of the six regions of the brain and its choroid plexus: the olfactory bulbs, the telencephalon, the diencephalon, the mesencephalon, the rhombencephalon, and thecerebellum. We also report on the comparative anatomy of the plexus brachialis responsible for the innervation of the forelimbs. It is commonly thought that amphibians have a simplified brain organization, associated with their supposedly limited behavioral complexity and reduced motor skills. We compare frogs with different ecologies that also use their limbs in different contexts and for other functions. Our results show that brain morphology is more complex and more variable than typically assumed. Moreover, variation in brainmorphology among species appears related to locomotor behavior as suggested by our quantitative analyses.Thus we propose that brain morphology may be related to the locomotor mode, at least in the frogs included in our analysis.