Dr Todd C. Rae

RESEARCH INTERESTS

My primary research interests are in three major areas:

• Craniofacial morphology
• Evolution of anthropoid primates, and
• Theory and method of phylogenetic inference

My interest in the evolution of the Anthropoidea (monkeys and apes, including humans) led me early in my career to consider the facial skeleton as a key region for the explication of the pattern of evolutionary relationships among this group of primates. Composed of many different bones and linked to both individual and species recognition, the face can provide a wealth of information from which evolutionary inferences can be made. Facial data have been used to test previous hypotheses of phylogeny of extant and extinct catarrhines, or Old World anthropoid primates.

I am currently exploring these topics further, in two distinct directions. My facial work has led to a collaboration with Thomas Koppe of the Institute of Anatomy, Ernst Moritz Arndt University, Greifswald (Germany), to investigate the evolution of cranial pnuematization (and the maxillary sinus, in particular) in anthropoids. Together, we have begun to explain the pattern of change in sinus size in extant monkeys and apes, and are just beginning to explore sinus spaces in fossil primates, as well. I also maintain a keen interest in techniques of phylogenetic reconstruction; this has spawned further work in morphometrics (the science of quantifying anatomical shape), including the treatment of morphometrics and polymorphisms in phylogenetic systematics.

TEACHING AREAS

Primate evolution

Palaeoprimatology

Craniofacial morphology

RECENT PUBLICATIONS

Rae, TC and Koppe, T (in press) Independence of biomechanical forces and craniofacial pneumatization in Cebus. Anatomical Record

Kuykendal, K and Rae, TC (in press) Presence of the maxillary sinus in the fossil colobine Cercopithecoides williamsi from South Africa: an assessment using computed tomography. Anatomical Record

Rae, TC (2008) Paranasal pneumatization in extant and fossil Cercopithecoidea. Journal of Human Evolution 54, 279-286

Rae, T, Röhrer-Ertl, O, Wallner, C-P and Koppe, T (2007) Paranasal pneumatization of two late Miocene colobines: Mesopithecus and Libypithecus (Cercopithecidae: Primates). Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 27, 768-771

Rae, T, Strand Viðarsdóttir, U, Jeffery, N and Steegmann, AT Jr (2006) Developmental response to cold stress in Rattus: implications for the interpretation of climatic adaptation in fossil hominins. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 273, 2605-2610

Rae, TC and Koppe, T (2004) Holes in the head: evolutionary interpretations of the paranasal sinuses in catarrhines. Evolutionary Anthropology 13, 211-223

Rae, TC (2004) Miocene hominoid craniofacial morphology and the emergence of great apes. Annals of Anatomy (Anat. Anz.) 186, 417-422.

Rae, TC and Koppe, T (2003) The term “lateral recess” and craniofacial pneumatization in Old World monkeys (Mammalia, Primates, Cercopithecoidea). Journal of Morphology 258, 193-199

Rae, TC, Hill, RA, Hamada, Y and Koppe, T (2003) Clinal variation of maxillary sinus volume in Japanese macaques (Macaca fuscata). American Journal of Primatology 59, 153-158

Rae, TC, Koppe, T, Spoor, F, Benefit, B and McCrossin, M (2002) Ancestral loss of the maxillary sinus in Old World monkeys and independent acquisition in Macaca. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 117, 293-296

Rae, TC and Koppe, T (2000) Isometric scaling of maxillary sinus size in Hominoidea. Journal of Human Evolution 38, 411-423