Dataset Information

The dual role of Amazonian rivers in the generation and maintenance of avian diversity.

ABSTRACT: The Amazon River and its major tributaries delimit the distributions of hundreds of terrestrial taxa. It remains unclear whether river-bounded distributions and taxon replacements reflect the historical role of rivers in generating species diversity as vicariant forces, or are the result of their role as secondary barriers, maintaining current levels of species diversity by inhibiting gene flow and population introgression. We use a community-wide comparative phylogeographic and phylogenetic approach to address the roles that the Rio Negro and the Rio Branco play in the avian speciation process in the Guiana Shield. Examining 74 pairs of ecologically similar geographic replacements that turn over across the lower Negro, we found substantial variation in the levels of genetic divergence and the inferred timing of diversification among pairs, ranging from ~0.24 to over 8 million years (Ma ago). The breadth of this variation is inconsistent with a single, shared speciation event. Coalescent simulations also rejected a simultaneous divergence scenario for pairs divided by the Rio Branco but could not reject a single diversification pulse for a subset of 12 pairs of taxa divided by the upper Negro. These results are consistent with recent geomorphological hypotheses regarding the origins of these rivers. Phylogenetically, taxon pairs represent a blend of sister (~40%) and nonsister taxa (~60%), consistent with river-associated allopatric or peripatric speciation and secondary contact, respectively. Our data provide compelling evidence that species turnover across the Rio Negro basin encompasses a mixture of histories, supporting a dual role for Amazonian rivers in the generation and maintenance of biological diversity.

SUBMITTER: Naka LN

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6070317 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

The dual role of Amazonian rivers in the generation and maintenance of avian diversity.

Naka Luciano N LN Brumfield Robb T RT

Science advances 20180801 8

The Amazon River and its major tributaries delimit the distributions of hundreds of terrestrial taxa. It remains unclear whether river-bounded distributions and taxon replacements reflect the historical role of rivers in generating species diversity as vicariant forces, or are the result of their role as secondary barriers, maintaining current levels of species diversity by inhibiting gene flow and population introgression. We use a community-wide comparative phylogeographic and phylogenetic app ...[more]

PMID: 30083603

Similar Datasets

Project description:BackgroundSpecies movement responses to landscape structures have been studied using a variety of methods, but movement research is still in need of simple methods that help predicting and comparing movements across structurally different landscapes. We demonstrate how habitat-specific movement models can be used to disentangle causes of differentiated movement patterns in structurally different landscapes and to predict movement patterns in altered and artificial landscapes. In our case study, we studied the role of riparian landscapes to the persistence of the endangered false heath fritillary butterfly (Melitaea diamina) in its newly discovered coastal distribution region in Finland. We compared the movement parameters of the riparian population to two reference populations by using capture-recapture data and habitat-specific diffusion modelling, and analysed the role of the river and riverbank buffer zones in facilitating or hindering false heath fritillary movement with movement simulations.ResultsThe riparian population of the false heath fritillary did not show major differences to reference populations in terms of movement parameters within breeding habitat, high-quality matrix and low-quality matrix. However, movement simulations showed that the habitat-specific movement parameters estimated for the false heath fritillary can lead into markedly different movement patterns in structurally different landscapes. An artificial riparian landscape mimicking those of the coastal distribution resulted into more directional, longitudinal movements both parallel and perpendicular to the river than a more mosaic-like landscape, but the existence of the river in the landscape reduced movements across the river.ConclusionsOur study demonstrates how habitat-specific movement models enable comparisons of movement patterns across structurally different real, altered and artificial landscapes. As such, they can be used to compare movement parameters across populations, to study the effects of management interventions to endangered species and to identify areas that have high sensitivity to individual movement. In our case study, the river is shown to perform a dual role for the movements of the riparian false heath fritillary population. Whereas the river acts as a moderate movement barrier for the false heath fritillary, the longitudinal configuration of riverbank habitats provides a means especially for the male false heath fritillaries to move across the landscape.

Dataset Information

The dual role of Amazonian rivers in the generation and maintenance of avian diversity.

Publications

The dual role of Amazonian rivers in the generation and maintenance of avian diversity.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets