From offshore to onshore: multiple origins of shallow-water corals from deep-sea ancestors.

ABSTRACT: Shallow-water tropical reefs and the deep sea represent the two most diverse marine environments. Understanding the origin and diversification of this biodiversity is a major quest in ecology and evolution. The most prominent and well-supported explanation, articulated since the first explorations of the deep sea, holds that benthic marine fauna originated in shallow, onshore environments, and diversified into deeper waters. In contrast, evidence that groups of marine organisms originated in the deep sea is limited, and the possibility that deep-water taxa have contributed to the formation of shallow-water communities remains untested with phylogenetic methods. Here we show that stylasterid corals (Cnidaria: Hydrozoa: Stylasteridae)--the second most diverse group of hard corals--originated

SUBMITTER: Lindner A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2424010 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature