| Abstract: | Through a series of interrogatories, unsolved problems of antler evolution, anatomy, development, physiology, and pathology are probed, with commentaries on the following prospects for future research: - 1. How could these improbable appendages have evolved mechanisms to commit suicide, jettison the corpse, and regenerate new ones every year?
- 2. By what developmental processes are antlers able to prescribe their own morphogenesis with mirror image accuracy year after year and in some cases produce deliberate asymmetries?
- 3. What causes the scalp to transform into velvet skin as a deer's first antlers develop?
- 4. Why do healing pedicle stumps give rise to antler buds instead of scar tissue?
- 5. How is the unprecedented rate of antler elongation related to the diameter and length of the structure to be grown?
- 6. How come wound healing by pedicle skin is held in abeyance for several months until new growth resumes?
- 7. How is it that tropical deer regenerate antlers at any time of year, while in temperate zones deer do so in seasonal unison?
- 8. How do deer find enough calcium to make such massive antlers in only a few months?
- 9. What is the nature of the bizarre tumors that some antlers grow following castration? © 1995 Wiley-Liss, Inc.
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