Palaeogenomics of pterosaurs and the evolution of small genome size in flying vertebrates.

ABSTRACT: The two living groups of flying vertebrates, birds and bats, both have constricted genome sizes compared with their close relatives. But nothing is known about the genomic characteristics of pterosaurs, which took to the air over 70 Myr before birds and were the first group of vertebrates to evolve powered flight. Here, we estimate genome size for four species of pterosaurs and seven species of basal archosauromorphs using a Bayesian comparative approach. Our results suggest that small genomes commonly associated with flight in bats and birds also evolved in pterosaurs, and that the rate of genome-size evolution is proportional to genome size within amniotes, with the fastest rates occurring in lineages with the largest genomes. We examine the role that drift may have played in the evoluti

SUBMITTER: Organ CL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2657748 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature