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About the Cover
Cover: The remarkable agility of this diving juvenile alligator, which sports a green inclinometer measuring pitch and roll, is due in part to her ability to control posture by manipulating her center of buoyancy using several muscles previously thought to function exclusively for ventilation (see study by T. J. Uriona and C. G. Farmer, pp. 1141−1147). These muscles are active during pitching and rolling maneuvers independent of ventilation, and shift the location of lung gases and therefore the center of buoyancy. The musculoskeletal complex employed may have primitively served aquatic locomotion rather than respiration, and thus may have evolved when Crocodylomorpha assumed a semi-aquatic lifestyle.
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