Evolution of high trophic diversity based on limited functional disparity in the feeding apparatus of marine angelfishes (f. Pomacanthidae).

ABSTRACT: The use of biting to obtain food items attached to the substratum is an ecologically widespread and important mode of feeding among aquatic vertebrates, which rarely has been studied. We did the first evolutionary analyses of morphology and motion kinematics of the feeding apparatus in Indo-Pacific members of an iconic family of biters, the marine angelfishes (f. Pomacanthidae). We found clear interspecific differences in gut morphology that clearly reflected a wide range of trophic niches. In contrast, feeding apparatus morphology appeared to be conserved. A few unusual structural innovations enabled angelfishes to protrude their jaws, close them in the protruded state, and tear food items from the substratum at a high velocity. Only one clade, the speciose pygmy angelfishes, showed funct

SUBMITTER: Konow N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3164712 | biostudies-literature | 2011

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature