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Nancy
Stevens, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor Functional Morphology &
Vertebrate Paleontology
Department of Biomedical Sciences
Patient Centered Continuum (PCC) Director
stevensn@ohio.edu
133 Life Sciences Building
740-597-2785 |
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My
research considers a host of locomotor kinematic and
kinetic questions in animal models, with a specific
focus on issues relating to balance and stability.
For example, the arboreal environment provides a
convenient context for examining accommodations to mediolateral, anteroposterior, and superoinferior
balance challenges that can be addressed by altering
substrate size, orientation and compliance in the
laboratory setting. Using a range of simulated
arboreal substrate types, I have examined limb postures and the role of interlimb coordination with
information from the visual and vestibular systems
across a broad range of primate morphotypes,
exploring how the sequence and timing of limb
movements may be related to specific anatomical
features. This work is extended to include
non-primate models in the lab, and by testing
hypotheses generated by this work with locomotor
data collected in well-calibrated naturalistic
settings in Madagascar and elsewhere. |
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My work also
draws on comparative vertebrate anatomy and
the application of functional morphological
approaches to paleontological questions.
Work in the Red Sandstone Group of
southwestern Tanzania has revealed a rich
new Paleogene vertebrate fauna from a
critically undersampled region on the
African continent, providing a comparative
dataset to examine geographic and temporal
patterns in faunal evolution after the close
of the Mesozoic. Paleontological specimen
recovery and analysis elsewhere (e.g.,
Namibia, Angola, Yemen, Oman) add data to an
emerging picture of Afro-Arabian biotic
diversity prior to Neogene immigration of
Eurasian faunas across the Arabian
Peninsula. These data are necessary in order
to better unravel the roles of phylogeny and
environment in shaping the development of
fine morphological differences associated
with specific locomotor and dietary regimes. |
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