About

Danielle M. Peterman is an Associate Teaching Professor at Penn State's Ross and Carol Nese College of Nursing. She is a member of the Beta Sigma Leadership Succession Committee and is based at the Sheetz Family Health Center at Penn State Altoona. Her role involves teaching and contributing to the academic programs within the college, which include undergraduate, master's, Doctor of Nursing Practice, and post-graduate APRN certificate programs. Her professional focus is aligned with nursing education and leadership, supporting the college's mission to prepare nursing professionals through accredited programs. Contact information for Dr. Peterman includes her phone number and email at Penn State Altoona.

Research topics

• Geology
• Paleontology
• Computer science
• Biology
• Geography

Selected publications

• Cteno-bot 3D models of all components and example footage

  Open MIND · 2026-02-24

  dataset1st authorCorresponding

  This zip folder contains 3D models (in .STL format) of all model components used to build Cteno-bot. This robot, inspired by ctenophores (comb jellies), is untethered and uses magnetoactive elastomers to coordinate dozens to hundreds of metachronally beating propulsors. An example video of the swimming Cteno-bot is also included.

  DOI

• Exploring the influence of cameral deposits on the stability, orientation, and maneuverability of orthocone cephalopods

  Paleobiology · 2026-01-14

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract Orthoceratoid cephalopods had straight or slightly curved shells that often contained enigmatic calcareous structures in their chambers. These cameral deposits have been interpreted as counterweights, allowing these cephalopods to assume postures other than a default, downward-facing orientation. These animals must have balanced the proportions of their soft body, cameral deposits, and air-filled chambers to maintain a condition near neutral buoyancy. Lower body chamber ratios (BCRs) allow more mass to be dedicated to cameral deposits, increasing their influence over the total mass distribution. Using 43 computer reconstructions, we calculated the proportion of chamber contents that satisfy a neutrally buoyant condition across different BCRs. Furthermore, we explored the limits of cameral deposit distributions inside the shell to better understand their influence over orientation, stability, and maneuverability. Cephalopods with 40% BCR cannot accommodate any deposits and assume stable, downward-facing orientations. Cephalopods with 30% BCR allow some cameral deposits, which negligibly reduce stability. A slight reduction in BCR to 25% can considerably improve maneuverability, allowing these cephalopods to assume a wider range of postures while swimming. While our results are most relevant to some subset of orthocone cephalopods (Pseudorthoceratida), we also highlight similar constraints faced by broader orthocone groups. Swimming capabilities are extremely sensitive to BCR, which likely constrains the life habits and ecology of these animals. Our results add context to (1) the physical constraints of orthocone cephalopods, (2) their functional complexity in Paleozoic ecosystems, and (3) how these early swimmers navigated physical trade-offs between stability and maneuverability.

  PublisherDOI

• Hydromechanics of ammonoid conch ornamentation: trade-offs between rocking attenuation and drag reduction

  Paleobiology · 2025-08-01 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract Ammonoid cephalopods are excellent model systems for evolutionary biomechanics due to their volatile evolutionary dynamics and remarkable fossil record. During the Mesozoic marine revolution, natural selection increasingly favored ammonoid shells with specific ranges of ornamentation patterns (projections that influence surface roughness). While this evolutionary pattern has been attributed to enemy-driven evolution (i.e., escalation), many morphologies lack clear defensive roles. Using a combination of 3D modeling, physical experiments, and computer simulations, we investigate these patterns from a hydromechanical perspective. We model theoretical morphologies along a continuum of increasing ornamentation coarseness. Neutrally buoyant, 3D-printed models, weighted to match the mass distribution of their virtual counterparts, demonstrate that coarser patterns progressively attenuate rocking motions. Flow visualization experiments reveal these coarser patterns produce higher energy dissipation rates in the disturbed fluid. Computational fluid dynamics simulations were performed to characterize the hydrodynamic costs of ornamentation patterns over the majority of biologically relevant swimming speeds and shell sizes for planispiral ammonoids. Only the coarsest categories incur substantial increases in hydrodynamic drag. However, ornamentation patterns with intermediate coarseness effectively avoid this physical trade-off, experiencing dynamic stabilization without considerably reducing swimming efficiency. These trade-off-defying morphologies were progressively favored during the Mesozoic, becoming more abundant than others by the end of this era. Ultimately, these experiments highlight important hydromechanical selective pressures involved in ammonoid evolutionary trends and some fundamental constraints on aquatic locomotion more broadly.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Reconstructing orthocone cephalopods: did cameral deposits function as counterweights?

  Abstracts with programs - Geological Society of America · 2025-01-01

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• A Description of the New Hybodont Shark Genus, Columnaodus, from the Burlington and Keokuk Limestones (Carboniferous, Mississippian, Osagean) of Illinois and Iowa, USA

  Diversity · 2024-05-06 · 4 citations

  articleOpen access

  Bonebeds occurring in exposures of the Burlington and Keokuk Limestones (Mississippian/Osagean) along the Iowa and Illinois border (USA) contain an abundant and diverse collection of chondrichthyan remains that includes teeth, spines, denticles, and coprolites. These remains represent cochliodont, hybodont, petalodont, ctenacanthid, symmoriid, and acanthodian (stem chondrichthyan) taxa. The thickest of these beds, herein referred to as the Burlington–Keokuk bonebed, occurs at the top of the Burlington Limestone and presents a remarkable opportunity to study the assemblage of mid-continent, Middle Mississippian chondrichthyans. Bulk matrix samples of this bonebed were collected from two quarries (Biggsville Quarry, Biggsville, IL, USA, and Nelson Quarry, Mediapolis, IA, USA) and disaggregated. Among the multitude of previously known taxa, several teeth represented a new genus and species of hybodont shark. Herein, we describe these teeth as Columnaodus witzkei (gen. et sp. nov.), a hybodontiform with dental features comparable to unnamed specimens reported from elsewhere.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Encoding spatiotemporal asymmetry in artificial cilia with a ctenophore-inspired soft-robotic platform

  arXiv (Cornell University) · 2024-07-18

  preprintOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  A remarkable variety of organisms use metachronal coordination (i.e., numerous neighboring appendages beating sequentially with a fixed phase lag) to swim or pump fluid. This coordination strategy is used by microorganisms to break symmetry at small scales where viscous effects dominate and flow is time-reversible. Some larger organisms use this swimming strategy at intermediate scales, where viscosity and inertia both play important roles. However, the role of individual propulsor kinematics - especially across hydrodynamic scales - is not well-understood, though the details of propulsor motion can be crucial for the efficient generation of flow. To investigate this behavior, we developed a new soft robotic platform using magnetoactive silicone elastomers to mimic the metachronally coordinated propulsors found in swimming organisms. Furthermore, we present a method to passively encode spatially asymmetric beating patterns in our artificial propulsors. We investigated the kinematics and hydrodynamics of three propulsor types, with varying degrees of asymmetry, using Particle Image Velocimetry and high-speed videography. We find that asymmetric beating patterns can move considerably more fluid relative to symmetric beating at the same frequency and phase lag, and that asymmetry can be passively encoded into propulsors via the interplay between elastic and magnetic torques. Our results demonstrate that nuanced differences in propulsor kinematics can substantially impact fluid pumping performance. Our soft robotic platform also provides an avenue to explore metachronal coordination at the meso-scale, which in turn can inform the design of future bioinspired pumping devices and swimming robots.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Encoding spatiotemporal asymmetry in artificial cilia with a ctenophore-inspired soft-robotic platform

  Bioinspiration & Biomimetics · 2024-09-10 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  A remarkable variety of organisms use metachronal coordination (i.e. numerous neighboring appendages beating sequentially with a fixed phase lag) to swim or pump fluid. This coordination strategy is used by microorganisms to break symmetry at small scales where viscous effects dominate and flow is time-reversible. Some larger organisms use this swimming strategy at intermediate scales, where viscosity and inertia both play important roles. However, the role of individual propulsor kinematics-especially across hydrodynamic scales-is not well-understood, though the details of propulsor motion can be crucial for the efficient generation of flow. To investigate this behavior, we developed a new soft robotic platform using magnetoactive silicone elastomers to mimic the metachronally coordinated propulsors found in swimming organisms. Furthermore, we present a method to passively encode spatially asymmetric beating patterns in our artificial propulsors. We investigated the kinematics and hydrodynamics of three propulsor types, with varying degrees of asymmetry, using Particle Image Velocimetry and high-speed videography. We find that asymmetric beating patterns can move considerably more fluid relative to symmetric beating at the same frequency and phase lag, and that asymmetry can be passively encoded into propulsors via the interplay between elastic and magnetic torques. Our results demonstrate that nuanced differences in propulsor kinematics can substantially impact fluid pumping performance. Our soft robotic platform also provides an avenue to explore metachronal coordination at the meso-scale, which in turn can inform the design of future bioinspired pumping devices and swimming robots.

  PublisherDOI

• A MARINE VERTEBRATE FAUNA FROM THE EARLY PERMIAN (ARTINSKIAN) LUEDERS FORMATION OF NORTH-CENTRAL TEXAS, USA

  The Southwestern Naturalist · 2024-05-16

  article

  Los fósiles del Sistema Pérmico en Texas tienen una larga historia de estudio para las comunidades de vertebrados terrestres y de agua dulce. Sin embargo, las comunidades de vertebrados de ecosistemas completamente marinos han sido menos estudiados. Esta tendencia es especialmente cierta para las comunidades marinos en el Pérmico Inferior. Este escaso registro de localidades dificulta ilustrar adecuadamente la vida de los vertebrados en los océanos del Pérmico Temprano. Una mejor caracterización de estas comunidades proporciona un contexto útil para las respuestas bióticas a las perturbaciones ambientales del Pérmico Temprano (por ejemplo, las reorganizaciones bióticas y los cambios climáticos que rodean el Evento de Calentamiento Artinskiano). Aquí describimos una fauna que consta de 11 taxones de vertebrados de la porción marina de la Formación Lueders inferior en el condado de Shackelford, Texas (EE. UU.), que persiste a lo largo de múltiples horizontes calcificados productores de huesos y dientes. Los condrictios aquí están representados por hibodontiformes (?Acrodus, “Lissodus”), ctenacántidos, neoselaquios (Cooleyella), petalodóntidos (Janassa), holocéfalos (Deltodus) y Amelacanthus. Los restos de peces osteíctio consisten principalmente en Platysomids y otros paleoniscoids. Estos nuevos informes pintan una imagen más clara de los ecosistemas de vertebrados marinos en la cuenca del Pérmico de América del Norte y actualizan la paleobiogeografía de los taxones del Pérmico Temprano reportados en otras partes del mundo.

  PublisherDOI

• Paradox lost: wide gape in the Ordovician brachiopod <i>Rafinesquina</i> explains how unattached filter‐feeding strophomenoids thrived on muddy substrates

  Palaeontology · 2024-03-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Strophomenoid brachiopods had thin, concavo‐convex shells, were ubiquitous colonizers of Palaeozoic muddy seafloors, and are hypothesized to have filter‐fed in a concave‐upward orientation. This orientation would elevate their line of commissure out of potentially lethal lophophore‐clogging mud. The paradox is that epibiont distributions on strophomenoids support a convex‐upward life position, as do studies of strophomenoid stability and trace fossils formed by strophomenoid sediment‐clearing. A premise of the concave‐upward orientation hypothesis is a narrow gape, which causes narrow, high velocity inhalant currents, leaving strophomenoids vulnerable to sediment entrainment. Herein we investigate the gape angle of Rafinesquina using serial thin sections and peels, silicified specimens, computer modelling, SEM analysis, x‐ray microCT, and 3D printing. Hinge line structure suggests that, conservatively, Rafinesquina could gape 40–45°. Such a gape occurred when diductor muscle contraction could not cause any further rotation, hinge teeth and crenulations were disengaged, and interareas interlocked. In contrast, when closed, hinge teeth were locked in hinge sockets. This wide gape eliminates constraints on feeding orientation. In either convex‐up or concave‐up orientation, Rafinesquina could feed with slow, diffuse inhalant currents incapable of disturbing sediment, and could snap valves shut to forcefully expel enough water to clear sediment from the mantle cavity, explaining previously described moat‐shaped trace fossils associated with shells. Our findings demonstrate that Rafinesquina gaped at an angle approximately equal to the angle between the two interareas when the valves are closed. Our analyses hint that other strophomenoids with similar interarea angles also lived with their shells widely agape.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• CMC IP98741 Brachiopod 3D Models

  Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) · 2023-04-25

  datasetOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  3D models of the pedicle valve and brachial valve of the brachiopod, <em>Rafinesquina</em>. These models demonstrate the function of the hinge, and how each valve interlocks. These models are derived from the specimen CMC IP98741 (Cincinnati Museum Center Invertebrate Paleontology), and were created by Aaron Morse and Benjamin Dattilo.

  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• EAR-PF Bringing fossil cephalopods back to life: virtual and physical assessment of hydrostatics, hydrodynamics, and functional morphology

  NSF · $174k · 2020–2022

Frequent coauthors

• Charles N. Ciampaglio

  19 shared

• Kathleen A. Ritterbush

  University of Utah

  17 shared

• Nicholas Hebdon

  14 shared

• Ryan Shell

  US Forest Service

  10 shared

• Stephen Jacquemin

  Wright State University

  7 shared

• Margaret M. Yacobucci

  7 shared

• Christopher C. Barton

  Wright State University

  6 shared

• Ryan Shell

  Cincinnati Museum Center

  6 shared

Education

• PhD, Earth and Environmental Sciences

  Wright State University