Abstract
The rock dove (or common pigeon), Columba livia, is an important model organism in biological studies, including research focusing on head muscle anatomy, feeding kinematics, and cranial kinesis. However, no integrated computer-based biomechanical model of the pigeon head has yet been attempted. As an initial step towards achieving this goal, we present the first three-dimensional digital dissection of the pigeon head based on a contrast-enhanced computed tomographic dataset achieved using iodine potassium iodide as a staining agent. Our datasets enable us to visualize the skeletal and muscular anatomy, brain and cranial nerves, and major sense organs of the pigeon, including very small and fragile features, as well as maintaining the three-dimensional topology of anatomical structures. This work updates and supplements earlier anatomical work on this widely used laboratory organism. We resolve several key points of disagreement arising from previous descriptions of pigeon anatomy, including the precise arrangement of the external adductor muscles and their relationship to the posterior adductor. Examination of the eye muscles highlights differences between avian taxa and shows that pigeon eye muscles are more similar to those of a tinamou than they are to those of a house sparrow. Furthermore, we present our three-dimensional data as publicly accessible files for further research and education purposes. Digital dissection permits exceptional visualisation and will be a valuable resource for further investigations into the head anatomy of other bird species, as well as efforts to reconstruct soft tissues in fossil archosaurs.
Highlights
The rock dove (Columba livia), known as the common or domestic pigeon, is one of the most abundant, widely distributed, and morphologically disparate bird species, including over 350 breeds [1, 2], and has a long association with human culture [3]
Careful documentation of variations in rock dove morphology and behaviour were key to the development of evolutionary theory [4] and, more recently, it has become an important model organism in biological sciences, including genetics [5, 6], evolutionary biology [1, 2, 6,7,8], neuroscience and behaviour [9,10,11,12,13], vision [14], biomimetics [15], developmental biology [16], medicine [17, 18] and biomechanics [19, 20], including feeding studies [21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29]
We focus on musculoskeletal anatomy, our work covers some aspects of the cranial nerves, glands, and eye
Summary
The rock dove (Columba livia), known as the common or domestic pigeon, is one of the most abundant, widely distributed, and morphologically disparate bird species, including over 350 breeds [1, 2], and has a long association with human culture [3]. Most taxa (e.g., Columba, Streptopelia) use their jaws primarily to garner loose seeds and grains and to gather twigs for nests; they will occasionally feed on insects and fruit [25, 27, 28, 30, 31, 42]. Other species, such as Duculua aenea, the Nicobar green (2019) 5:17
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