ArticleNature ecology & evolution2017
Meckel's cartilage breakdown offers clues to mammalian middle ear evolution.
Article in Nature ecology & evolution, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 29 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
29 citing papers in PubMed, 56 citations in OpenAlex.
- The XenCart Protocol: A method for Alcian blue labeling and quantitative analysis of craniofacial cartilage in Xenopus.Journal of anatomy · 2026Article
- Ontogeny of the malleus in Mesocricetus auratus (Mammalia, Rodentia): Systematic and functional implications for the muroid middle ear.Anatomical record (Hoboken, N.J. : 2007) · 2026Article
- Meckel's cartilage midsegment: spatiotemporal dynamics and osteogenic role in mice.Cell and tissue research · 2026Article
- Biomechanics of the mandibular middle ear of the cynodontProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Making sense of vertebrate senses from a neural crest and cranial placode evo-devo perspective.Trends in neurosciences · 2025Review
- Article
- Article
- Sphenomandibular ligament and degenerating Meckel's cartilage revisited: Sequential variations with temporal bone deformity for ligament attachment in near-term human fetuses.Journal of anatomy · 2024Article
- Middle ear innovation in Early Cretaceous eutherian mammals.Nature communications · 2023Article
- Evolution and development of the mammalian jaw joint: Making a novel structure.Evolution & development · 2023Review
- Altered developmental programs and oriented cell divisions lead to bulky bones during salamander limb regeneration.Nature communications · 2022Article
- Spatial and chronological localization of septoclasts in the mouse Meckel's cartilage.Histochemistry and cell biology · 2022Article
- A new mammal from the Lower Cretaceous Jehol Biota and implications for eutherian evolution.Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences · 2022Article
- Postnatal development in a marsupial model, the fat-tailed dunnart (Sminthopsis crassicaudata; Dasyuromorphia: Dasyuridae).Communications biology · 2021Article
- Exploring ancestral phenotypes and evolutionary development of the mammalian middle ear based on Early Cretaceous Jehol mammals.National science review · 2021Article
- Making and shaping endochondral and intramembranous bones.Developmental dynamics : an official publication of the American Association of Anatomists · 2021Review
- Uncovering the secreted signals and transcription factors regulating the development of mammalian middle ear ossicles.Developmental dynamics : an official publication of the American Association of Anatomists · 2020Review
- Article
- The TMJ Disc Is a Common Ancestral Feature in All Mammals, as Evidenced by the Presence of a Rudimentary Disc During Monotreme Development.Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2020Article
- Diverse Fate of an Enigmatic Structure: 200 Years of Meckel's Cartilage.Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2020Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
A key transformation in mammalian ear evolution was incorporation of the primary jaw joint of premammalian synapsids into the definitive mammalian middle ear of living mammals. This evolutionary transition occurred in two-steps, starting with a partial or "transitional" mammalian middle ear in which the ectotympanic and malleus were still connected to the mandible by an ossified Meckel's Cartilage (MC), as observed in many Mesozoic mammals. This was followed by MC breakdown, freeing the ectotympanic and the malleus from the mandible and creating the definitive mammalian middle ear. Here we report novel findings on the role of chondroclasts in MC breakdown, shedding light on how therian mammals lost MC connecting the ear to the jaw. Genetic or pharmacological loss of clast cells in mice and opossums leads to persistence of embryonic MC beyond juvenile stages, with MC ossification in mutant mice. The persistent MC causes a distinctive postnatal groove on the mouse dentary. This morphology phenocopies the ossified MC and Meckelian groove observed in Mesozoic mammals. Clast cell recruitment to MC is not observed in reptiles, where MC persists as a cartilaginous structure. We hypothesize that ossification of MC is an ancestral feature of mammaliaforms, and that a shift in the timing of clast cell recruitment to MC prior to its ossification is a key developmental mechanism for the evolution of the definitive mammalian middle ear in extant therians.
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.