Paleodistributions and comparative molecular phylogeography of leafcutter ants (Atta spp.) provide new insight into the origins of Amazonian diversity.

ABSTRACT: The evolutionary basis for high species diversity in tropical regions of the world remains unresolved. Much research has focused on the biogeography of speciation in the Amazon Basin, which harbors the greatest diversity of terrestrial life. The leading hypotheses on allopatric diversification of Amazonian taxa are the Pleistocene refugia, marine incursion, and riverine barrier hypotheses. Recent advances in the fields of phylogeography and species-distribution modeling permit a modern re-evaluation of these hypotheses. Our approach combines comparative, molecular phylogeographic analyses using mitochondrial DNA sequence data with paleodistribution modeling of species ranges at the last glacial maximum (LGM) to test these hypotheses for three co-distributed species of leafcutter ants (Atta

SUBMITTER: Solomon SE 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2447876 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature