DISSERTATION RESEARCH: Morphological consequences of trophic evolution

所有生命形式的一个共同特征是需要获取资源。与食物和喂养有关的资源，也被称为营养资源，一直是推动这个星球上生命多样性的主要因素。每三种活着的脊椎动物中就有一种是棘形鱼，这是一群有刺的鳍状鱼类，包括慈鲷和许多珊瑚礁鱼类。这一群体的成员消耗各种各样的资源，从刮掉其他鱼类的鳞片，过滤水中的浮游生物，咬下大块珊瑚，或积极捕食其他脊椎动物。鱼类如何有效地利用这些资源与它们的身体解剖密切相关，尤其是它们如何巧妙地操纵和捕获猎物。一些解剖学特征被认为会导致物种形成增加或灭绝率降低（这些被称为关键创新），但可能会限制饮食进化的灵活性。这是本研究要解决的关键问题。此外，本研究比较了不同年龄的群落是如何被它们的营养生态所塑造的。棘棘鱼也是常见的观赏鱼，提供了一个很好的机会来教育公众关于生物学的形式和功能，这项研究将通过制作互动软件来实现。了解产生和维持多样性的生态因素是生物学研究的一个主要目标。营养生态学就是这样一个因素，是进化的主要驱动力。棘形鱼类种类繁多，营养生态和形态多样，为研究营养进化提供了完美的系统。具体来说，本研究探讨了营养生态学如何促进或限制形态进化的速度，形态关键创新如何限制或促进饮食进化的速度，以及不同年龄的群落如何具有不同的营养进化模式，这些模式塑造了各自的鱼类区系。这项研究将使用比较系统发育方法，对于年轻的辐射，系统基因组学，来阐明物种之间的关系，并在比较进化框架中测试这些假设。这项研究将提供深入了解饮食是如何进化的，以及营养生态学对形态的宏观进化后果。

A unifying characteristic of all life forms is the need to acquire resources. Resources relating to food and feeding, also known as trophic resources, have been a leading factor in driving the diversity of life on this planet. One of every three living vertebrate species is an acanthomorph fish, a group of spiny-ray finned fishes that includes cichlids and many reef fishes. Members of this group consume a wide variety of resources, ranging from scraping scales off other fish, filtering plankton from the water, biting off chunks of coral, or actively hunting other vertebrates. How effectively the fish feed on these resources is intimately connected to their physical anatomy, especially how well the fish can maneuver and capture prey. Some anatomical traits are thought to lead to increased speciation or decreased extinction rates (these are known as key innovations) but may limit possible flexibility in diet evolution. This is the key question addressed by this research. In addition, this research compares how communities of different ages are shaped by their trophic ecologies. Acanthomorphs are also common aquarium fish, providing a great opportunity to educate the public about form and function in biology, which this research will do by producing interactive software.Understanding the ecological factors that generate and maintain diversity is a major goal in biological research. Trophic ecology is one such factor and is a major driver of evolution. Acanthomorph fishes provide the perfect system to study trophic evolution as they are extremely speciose and diverse in their trophic ecology and morphology. Specifically, this research investigates how trophic ecology may promote or constrain rates of morphological evolution, how morphological key innovations may constrain or promote rates of diet evolution, and how communities of different ages may have different patterns of trophic evolution that have shaped the respective fish fauna. This research will use comparative phylogenetic methods and, for young radiations, phylogenomics, to elucidate relationships of species and test these hypotheses in a comparative evolutionary framework. This research will provide insight into how diet evolves and the macroevolutionary consequences that trophic ecology has on morphology.