Macroevolutionary diversification with limited niche disparity in a species-rich lineage of cold-climate lizards.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Life diversifies via adaptive radiation when natural selection drives the evolution of ecologically distinct species mediated by their access to novel niche space, or via non-adaptive radiation when new species diversify while retaining ancestral niches. However, while cases of adaptive radiation are widely documented, examples of non-adaptively radiating lineages remain rarely observed. A prolific cold-climate lizard radiation from South America (Phymaturus), sister to a hyper-diverse adaptive radiation (Liolaemus), has extensively diversified phylogenetically and geographically, but with exceptionally minimal ecological and life-history diversification. This lineage, therefore, may offer unique opportunities to investigate the non-adaptive basis of diversification, and

SUBMITTER: Reaney AM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5801843 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature