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Publication Details
AFRICAN RESEARCH NEXUS
SHINING A SPOTLIGHT ON AFRICAN RESEARCH
general
Phylogenomic evidence for multiple losses of flight in ratite birds
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Volume 105, No. 36, Year 2008
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Description
Ratites (ostriches, emus, rheas, cassowaries, and kiwis) are large, flightless birds that have long fascinated biologists. Their current distribution on isolated southern land masses is believed to reflect the breakup of the paleocontinent of Gondwana. The prevailing view is that ratites are monophyletic, with the flighted tinamous as their sister group, suggesting a single loss of flight in the common ancestry of ratites. However, phylogenetic analyses of 20 unlinked nuclear genes reveal a genome-wide signal that unequivocally places tinamous within ratites, making ratites polyphyletic and suggesting multiple losses of flight. Phenomena that can mislead phylogenetic analyses, including long branch attraction, base compositional bias, discordance between gene trees and species trees, and sequence alignment errors, have been eliminated as explanations for this result. The most plausible hypothesis requires at least three losses of flight and explains the many morphological and behavioral similarities among ratites by parallel or convergent evolution. Finally, this phylogeny demands fundamental reconsideration of proposals that relate ratite evolution to continental drift. © 2008 by The National Academy of Sciences of the USA.
Authors & Co-Authors
Harshman, John
United States, Chicago
Field Museum of Natural History
Braun, Edward L.
United States, Gainesville
University of Florida
Braun, Michael J.
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
United States, College Park
University of Maryland, College Park
Huddleston, Christopher J.
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
Bowie, Rauri C. K.
United States, Chicago
Field Museum of Natural History
United States, Berkeley
University of California, Berkeley
South Africa, Stellenbosch
Stellenbosch University
Chojnowski, Jena L.
United States, Gainesville
University of Florida
Hackett, Shannon J.
United States, Chicago
Field Museum of Natural History
Han, Kin Lan
United States, Gainesville
University of Florida
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
United States, College Park
University of Maryland, College Park
Kimball, Rebecca T.
United States, Gainesville
University of Florida
Marks, Ben D.
United States, Baton Rouge
Louisiana State University
Miglia, Kathleen J.
United States, Detroit
Wayne State University
Moore, William Samuel
United States, Detroit
Wayne State University
Reddy, Sushma
United States, Chicago
Field Museum of Natural History
Sheldon, Frederick H.
South Africa, Stellenbosch
Stellenbosch University
Steadman, David W.
United States, Gainesville
Florida Museum of Natural History
Steppan, Scott J.
United States, Tallahassee
Florida State University
Witt, Christopher C.
United States, Baton Rouge
Louisiana State University
United States, Albuquerque
The University of new Mexico
Yuri, Tamaki
United States, Gainesville
University of Florida
United States, Washington, D.c.
Smithsonian Institution
Statistics
Citations: 199
Authors: 18
Affiliations: 11
Identifiers
Doi:
10.1073/pnas.0803242105
ISSN:
00278424
Research Areas
Cancer
Genetics And Genomics