Evolutionary History of Hipparionine Horses and the Early Radiation of Holarctic Hipparionini

合作研究人员之前的工作揭示了我们对海马素(三趾)马之间关系的一些关键知识空白，在进一步研究它们的进化史之前，必须填补这些空白。他们现在提议对北美海马科动物采石场样本和相关的、更原始的“merychippine”物种进行分析，以澄清所有海马科动物的进化关系。这项工作，再加上正在进行的关于旧大陆形态的工作，对于增进我们对这个群体1600万年的历史的了解将是重要的。反过来，解决这一组中的关系将使我们能够利用它进行省级和洲际地质对比，以及在此期间重建洲际联系。这些后面的研究对于理解全球气候的长期变化、过去的地理分布模式以及由此导致的哺乳动物物种形成模式之间的关系尤为重要。

Previous work by the co-investigators has revealed some critical gaps in our knowledge of relationships among hipparionine (3-toed) horses that must be filled before further work on their evolutionary history can be meaningfully pursued. They now propose to conduct analyses of North American hipparionine quarry samples and related, more primitive "merychippine" species, in order to clarify the evolutionary relationships of all hipparionine horses. This work, coupled with ongoing work on Old World forms, will be important for advancing our knowledge of the 16 million year history of this group. In turn, resolution of relationships in this group will allow us to use it for provincial and intercontinental geological correlations as well as for reconstruction of intercontinental connections during this period. These latter studies are particularly important for understanding the relationships between long-term changes in global climates, patterns of past geographic distributions, and resulting patterns of mammalian speciation.