Lizards of the lost arcs: mid-Cenozoic diversification, persistence and ecological marginalization in the West Pacific.

ABSTRACT: Regions with complex geological histories often have diverse and highly endemic biotas, yet inferring the ecological and historical processes shaping this relationship remains challenging. Here, in the context of the taxon cycle model of insular community assembly, we investigate patterns of lineage diversity and habitat usage in a newly characterized vertebrate radiation centred upon the world's most geologically complex insular region: island arcs spanning from the Philippines to Fiji. On island arcs taxa are ecologically widespread, and provide evidence to support one key prediction of the taxon cycle, specifically that interior habitats (lowland rainforests, montane habitats) are home to a greater number of older or relictual lineages than are peripheral habitats (coastal and open fore

SUBMITTER: Oliver PM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5805922 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature