The Lilliput effect in colonial organisms: cheilostome bryozoans at the Cretaceous-Paleogene mass extinction.

ABSTRACT: Consistent trends towards decreasing body size in the aftermath of mass extinctions--Lilliput effects--imply a predictable response among unitary animals to these events. The occurrence of Lilliput effects has yet to be widely tested in colonial organisms, which are of particular interest as size change may potentially occur at the two hierarchical levels of the colony and the individual zooids. Bryozoans are particularly useful organisms in which to study colonial size response as they have well-defined zooids. Additionally, a number of analyses of present-day bryozoans have shown that zooid size reflects local environmental conditions, most notably seawater temperature and possibly also food supply. Following the hypothesised decline in primary productivity at the Cretaceous-Paleogene (K

SUBMITTER: Sogot CE 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3914794 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature