Amazonian Amphibian Diversity Is Primarily Derived from Late Miocene Andean Lineages

ECU Author/Contributor (non-ECU co-authors, if there are any, appear on document)

Janalee P. Caldwell (Creator)

David C. Cannatella (Creator)

Luis A. Coloma (Creator)

Richard Ree (Creator)

Juan C. Santos (Creator)

Kyle Summers (Creator)

Institution

East Carolina University (ECU )

Web Site: http://www.ecu.edu/lib/

Abstract: The Neotropics contains half of remaining rainforests and Earth’s largest reservoir of amphibian biodiversity. However determinants of Neotropical biodiversity (i.e. vicariance dispersals extinctions and radiations) earlier than the Quaternary are largely unstudied. Using a novel method of ancestral area reconstruction and relaxed Bayesian clock analyses we reconstructed the biogeography of the poison frog clade (Dendrobatidae). We rejected an Amazonian center-of-origin in favor of a complex connectivity model expanding over the Neotropics. We inferred 14 dispersals into and 18 out of Amazonia to adjacent regions; the Andes were the major source of dispersals into Amazonia. We found three episodes of lineage dispersal with two interleaved periods of vicariant events between South and Central America. During the late Miocene Amazonian and Central American-Chocoan lineages significantly increased their diversity compared to the Andean and Guianan-Venezuelan-Brazilian Shield counterparts. Significant percentage of dendrobatid diversity in Amazonia and Choco´ resulted from repeated immigrations with radiations at 10.0 million years ago (MYA) rather than in situ diversification. In contrast the Andes Venezuelan Highlands and Guiana Shield have undergone extended in situ diversification at near constant rate since the Oligocene. The effects of Miocene paleogeographic events on Neotropical diversification dynamics provided the framework under which Quaternary patterns of endemism evolved. Originally published PLoS Biology Vol. 7 No. 3 Mar 2009

Additional Information

Publication

Other

PLoS Biology. 7:3(March 2009) p. e1000056.

Language: English

Date: 2011

Keywords

Neotropic, amphibian biodiversity, Miocene

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