Global biogeography and evolution of Cuvierina pteropods.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Shelled pteropods are planktonic gastropods that are potentially good indicators of the effects of ocean acidification. They also have high potential for the study of zooplankton evolution because they are metazoan plankton with a good fossil record. We investigated phenotypic and genetic variation in pteropods belonging to the genus Cuvierina in relation to their biogeographic distribution across the world's oceans. We aimed to assess species boundaries and to reconstruct their evolutionary history.

Results

We distinguished six morphotypes based on geometric morphometric analyses of shells from 926 museum and 113 fresh specimens. These morphotypes have distinct geographic distributions across the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans, and belong to three major gene

SUBMITTER: Burridge AK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4443520 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature