Keegan Selig
  • Assistant Professor
  • Document: CV
Research Areas
  • Biological Anthropology

Current Research Projects:

I study the form/ function relationship of the teeth. What does the shape of an animal's teeth tell us about what it eats? What does an animal's ecology (diet) tell us about its teeth? What are the dental adaptations of a given animal that help it deal with the challenges of its diet? I study this relationship in living animals, and I focus on primates and treeshrews.

I study diet in extinct species. Using methods derived from studying dental adaptation and diet in living species, we can reconstruct the diet of extinct species.

I study the evolutionary developmental (evo-devo) biology of teeth. How are molar size and complexity (phenotype) patterned? What developmental mechanisms (genotype) control these patterns? And how do differences in ecology manifest in different patterns of size/ complexity? What other organs develop in the same ways?

Research Interests

  • Dental morphology
  • Dental development
  • Primate evolution
  • Dietary reconstruction
  • Treeshrews and other mammals

Educational Background

  • PhD, University of Toronto, Canada, 2021

Selected Publications

  • K.R. Selig, R.L. Poutre, S.B.G. Chester, E.J. Sargis, D.M. Boyer. Additional morphological evidence for taxonomic diversity in the Pen-Tailed Treeshrew (Ptilocercus, Scandentia). 2025. Journal of Mammalogy. https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyaf022

    K.R. Selig, P.E. Morse, J.D. Pampush, R.F. Kay. Dental wear and its effect on molar pulp volume reduction in Macaca fascicularis. 2025. American Journal of Biological Anthropology. https://doi.org/10.1002/ajpa.70035

    A.H. Meares, K.R. Selig. 2025. Molar development and loss of the hypoconulid in treeshrews (Scandentia). Journal of Mammalian Evolution. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10914-025-09748-5.

    K.R. Selig, S. López-Torres, A.M. Burrows, M.T. Silcox. 2024. Dental topographic analysis of living and fossil lorisoids: investigations into markers of exudate feeding in lorises and galagos. International Journal of Primatology. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10764-024-00433-7

    K.R. Selig, S. López-Torres, A.M. Burrows, M.T. Silcox, J. Meng. 2024. Dental caries in living and extinct strepsirrhines with insight into diet and health. The Anatomical Record. https://doi.org/10.1002/ar.25420

    K.R. Selig. 2024. Hypoconulid loss in cercopithecins: Functional and developmental considerations. Journal of Human Evolution. 184, 103479.

    K.R. Selig, M.S. Ramsay, R. Lahosky, L. Schroeder, M.T. Silcox. 2024. Variation in dental morphology as a signal for dietary breadth in primates and their kin. Journal of Mammalogy. https://doi.org/10.1093/jmammal/gyae015

    K.R. Selig, M.T. Silcox. 2022. Measuring Molarization: Change through time in premolar function in an extinct stem primate lineage. Journal of Mammalian Evolution. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10914-022-09623-7.

    K.R. Selig, M.T. Silcox. 2021. The largest and earliest known sample of dental caries in an extinct mammal (Mammalia, Euarchonta, Microsyops latidens) and its ecological implications. Scientific Reports. 11, 15920.

    K.R. Selig, W. Khalid, M.T. Silcox. 2021. Mammalian molar complexity follows simple, predictable patterns. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 118 (1) e2008850118.

    M.T. Silcox, K.R. Selig, T.M. Bown, A.E. Chew, K.D. Rose. 2021. Cladogenesis and replacement in the fossil record of Microsyopidae (?Primates) from the southern Bighorn Basin, Wyoming. Biology Letters. 17: 20200824.

    K.R. Selig, E.J. Sargis, S.G.B. Chester, and M.T. Silcox. 2020. Using three-dimensional geometric morphometric and dental topographic analyses to reconstruct the systematics and paleoecology of fossil treeshrews (Scandentia). Journal of Paleontology. DOI: 10.1017/jpa.2020.36

    K.R. Selig, E.J. Sargis, M.T. Silcox. 2019. The frugivorous insectivores? Functional morphological analysis of molar topography for inferring diet in extant treeshrews (Scandentia). Journal of Mammalogy. 100(6):1901–1917.

    K.R. Selig, E.J. Sargis, M.T. Silcox. 2019. Three-dimensional geometric morphometric analysis of treeshrew (Scandentia) lower molars: Insight into dental variation and systematics. The Anatomical Record. 302: 1154–1168.

    K.R. Selig, S. López-Torres, E.J. Sargis, M.T. Silcox. 2019. First 3D dental topographic analysis of the enamel-dentine junction in non-primate euarchontans: Contribution of the enamel-dentine junction to molar morphology. Journal of Mammalian Evolution. 26: 587–598.