Statistical description of temperature-dependent sex determination using maximum likelihood

Temperature-dependent sex determination has been described in turtles, croc odilians, lizards and sphenodons. In such amniotes, sexual phenotype is det ermined based on the incubation temperature during embryonic development. T he description of temperature-dependent sex determination has often been pu rely qualitative, without any statistical inference. A new statistical meth od describing temperature-dependent sex determination with two parameters, the pivotal temperature and the transitional range of temperature producing both sexes, has been developed. The estimates and their standard deviation are produced using maximum likelihood. This method is applied using data f rom the literature.