Building a dinosaur: Triceratops myology

It's been a busy month as I prepare for a workshop at the University of Southampton followed by a few days in the field after which I can start writing up recent research. However, I have done some work on the 3D Triceratops project, researching how the muscles of the animal might have been configured in life. Any reconstruction of the musculature of an extinct animal will involve a degree of speculation, but we can ensure that this is informed by fact. By studying extant phylogenetic bracketing, functional morphology and the identification of osteological correlates (1) we can reconstruct the major muscle groups.

Here's the final reconstruction, and this now means I can continue with the 3D modelling of the dinosaur, adding muscle tone to the geometry via zBrush.

Triceratops horridus musculature. © Stuart Pond

Thanks to Scott Hartman for his invaluable help getting me started and subsequent comments.

Refs:

(1) Stephen L. Brusatte. 2012. Dinosaur Paleobiology. Chichester. John Wiley and Sons Ltd.