Bat Skeletal Growth: Molecular and Environmental Perspectives

The ability to perform true flight with a wing has set bats aside as unique and important vertebrates. How the hand of a primitive mammal might have evolved into a hand-wing remains an elusive yet challenging question facing biologists. This special issue was designed to bring together ideas about the growth and development of bats, specifically looking to integrate ideas on how the bat wing emerges as a unique structure from the embryonic hand, and where some of the most rapid growth occurs within the growth plates of the long bones. Contributions range from analysis of the molecular determinants of bone growth in bats, to growth and function of juvenile bats, and concluding with a study of the biomechanical demands placed upon the bones of the adult wing. The publication will be of special interest to scientists working on limb development and bone growth, including those who use a molecular or a gross approach to their studies.