Doctoral Dissertation: Historical Biogeography of the Antilles: Earth History and Phylogenetics of Endemic Chiropteran Taxa

美国自然历史博物馆的南希·西蒙斯、罗布·德萨尔和莉莉安娜·达瓦洛斯博士获得了一笔赠款，用于调查加勒比地区地球与动物群历史之间的关系，重点是蝙蝠。该项目将产生关于5种不同蝙蝠群体进化关系的假设，每种蝙蝠至少包含一种独特的安的列斯物种。然后，这些进化关系将用于确定安的列斯群岛蝙蝠物种及其南美和中美洲亲属之间分离的时间和模式，并将与其他陆地生物的类似假设进行比较。Nancy Simmons，Rob DeSalle和Liliana Davalos博士将使用标准方法获得和分析研究组的形态和分子数据。将采用至少5种不同的方法对这些数据产生的进化关系模式进行比较。这一项目将是第一个明确测试长期以来关于加勒比陆地动物进化的假设的项目。该项目产生的知识将是必不可少的生态，形态，行为和加勒比蝙蝠保护未来的生物学研究。通过描述物种多样化的模式，这项研究是了解加勒比动物的起源和演变，并确保在独特和日益受到威胁的加勒比生态系统中保护这些动物的重要一步。

A grant has been awarded to Drs. Nancy Simmons, Rob DeSalle, and Liliana Davalos at the American Museum of Natural History to investigate the relationship between earth and faunal history in the Caribbean region, focusing on bats. The project will generate hypotheses about the evolutionary relationships of 5 different groups of bats, each containing at least one exclusively Antillean species. These evolutionary relationships will then be used to establish the timing and pattern of separation among bat species in the Antilles and their South and Central American relatives, and will also be compared with similar hypotheses about other terrestrial organisms. Drs. Nancy Simmons, Rob DeSalle, and Liliana Davalos will use standard methods for obtaining and analyzing morphological and molecular data from the study groups. Patterns of evolutionary relationships resulting from these data will be compared applying at least 5 different approaches. This project will be the first to explictly test longstanding assumptions about the evolution of the Caribbean land fauna. The knowledge generated by this project will be essential for future biological studies in ecology, morphology, behavior, and conservation of Caribbean bats. By characterizing patterns of species diversification, this study constitutes an essential step towards understanding the origin and evolution of the fauna of the Caribbean, and ensuring its conservation in unique and increasingly threatened Caribbean ecosystems.