Data from: A new method for reconstructing brain morphology: applying the brain-neurocranial spatial relationship in an extant lungfish to a fossil endocast

Lungfish first appeared in the geological record over 410 million years
ago and are the closest living group of fish to the tetrapods.
Palaeoneurological investigations into the group show that unlike numerous
other fishes—but more similar to those in tetrapods—lungfish appear to
have had a close fit between the brain and the cranial cavity that housed
it. As such, researchers can use the endocast of fossil taxa (an internal
cast of the cranial cavity) both as a source of morphological data but
also to aid in developing functional and phylogenetic implications about
the group. Using fossil endocast data from a three-dimensional-preserved
Late Devonian lungfish from the Gogo Formation, Rhinodipterus, and the
brain-neurocranial relationship in the extant Australian lungfish,
Neoceratodus, we herein present the first virtually reconstructed brain of
a fossil lungfish. Computed tomographic data and a newly developed
‘brain-warping’ method are used in conjunction with our own distance map
software tool to both analyse and present the data. The brain
reconstruction is adequate, but we envisage that its accuracy and wider
application in other taxonomic groups will grow with increasing
availability of tomographic datasets.