Revealing the factors that control evolutionary diversification in birds

揭示控制鸟类进化多样化的因素

• 批准号: RGPIN-2018-06747
• 负责人: ClaramuntTammaro, Santiago
• 金额: $ 2.04万
• 依托单位: University of Toronto
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2018-01-01 至 2019-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=647761
• 关键词: Revealing; factors; control; evolutionary; diversification

My research seeks to understand how birds evolved and diversified. Although we know the basic mechanisms of formation of new species (speciation) and evolution of novel traits (phenotypic evolution), we know little about how these two processes interact through time and space and how they are affected by extinction, dispersal, geography, and ecological factors. Understanding these issues has important implications for the current biodiversity crisis by revealing the nature of the balance between speciation and extinction, assessing how fast biodiversity can adapt to environmental change, and identifying the factors that may affect biodiversity recovery.******The activities will focus on using DNA and morphological data to delimit species and estimate the evolutionary relationships among them. These evolutionary trees will then be used for estimating important parameters of the evolutionary process and its temporal dynamics using comparative methods and statistical modeling techniques. Regarding the influence of dispersal on diversification, I am investigating the use of estimates of flight performance, as assessed from wing morphology, as a proxy for the dispersal ability of bird species.******I will focus on the study of bird diversification at two scales. On a large scale, I will focus on all modern birds (Neornithes). I will use genomic and morphological datasets to generate a time-calibrated evolutionary tree of modern birds including at least one representative species of each family. Using a novel method for calibrating molecular clocks, we recently found a strong correlation between planetary temperatures and avian diversification rates. With improved divergence-time estimates and a more comprehensive sample of avian diversity, I will investigate the causes of such a correlation. In addition to increased taxonomic representation, I will improve previous estimates by using new method for calibrating molecular clocks and by determining the affinities of fossils birds that will be used for setting the time scale.******On a smaller scale, I will focus on the evolution of South American birds. Like Darwin's finches in the Galapagos islands, South American birds diversified both in number of lineages and in morphological and ecological traits but they have done so to a much greater degree and across an entire continent. Therefore, the study of South American birds can reveal the process that generated biodiversity on continents. Work towards reconstructing evolutionary trees of the South American is on-going but a major endeavor will be to resolve uncertainties regarding species limits in several species complexes and establish an accurate time scale.

我的研究旨在了解鸟类如何进化和多样化。虽然我们知道新物种形成（物种形成）和新性状进化（表型进化）的基本机制，但我们对这两个过程如何通过时间和空间相互作用以及它们如何受到灭绝，扩散，地理和生态因素的影响知之甚少。了解这些问题对当前的生物多样性危机具有重要意义，因为它揭示了物种形成和灭绝之间平衡的性质，评估生物多样性适应环境变化的速度，并确定可能影响生物多样性恢复的因素。这些活动将侧重于利用DNA和形态学数据来界定物种并估计它们之间的进化关系。这些进化树，然后将用于估计的进化过程中的重要参数和时间动态比较方法和统计建模技术。关于扩散对多样化的影响，我正在研究使用从翅膀形态评估的飞行性能估计值作为鸟类扩散能力的代表。我将集中在两个尺度上研究鸟类的多样化。在大范围内，我将集中在所有现代鸟类（新鸟类）。我将使用基因组和形态学数据集来生成一个现代鸟类的时间校准进化树，包括每个家庭至少一个代表性的物种。使用一种校准分子钟的新方法，我们最近发现行星温度和鸟类多样化率之间存在很强的相关性。随着改进的分歧时间估计和更全面的鸟类多样性的样本，我将调查这种相关性的原因。除了增加分类学的代表性，我还将通过使用校准分子钟的新方法和确定用于设定时间尺度的化石鸟类的亲和力来改进以前的估计。在一个较小的范围内，我将专注于南美洲鸟类的进化。就像加拉帕戈斯群岛上的达尔文雀一样，南美洲的鸟类在谱系数量、形态和生态特征上都多样化了，但它们在整个大陆上的多样化程度要大得多。因此，对南美洲鸟类的研究可以揭示大陆生物多样性的产生过程。重建南美洲进化树的工作正在进行中，但一个主要的奋进将是解决几个物种复合体中物种限制的不确定性，并建立一个准确的时间尺度。