Chromosomal change and rectangular evolution in North American cyprinid fishes

Abstract

SUMMARYAn important question in evolutionary biology concerns the manner and tempo in which organismal and/or genetic changes that promote evolutionary divergence occur. One recent hypothesis, termedrectangular evolution, holds that most significant evolutionary change occurs during occasional or periodic speciation episodes, with long periods of evolutionary stability in the interim. An alternative view, termedphyletic gradualism, holds that evolutionary divergences proceed by the slow and even accumulation of genetic differences within populations of established species. Two brief tests of rectangular evolution are presented using chromosomal data from North American cyprinid fishes (minnows), a group known to have experienced heterogeneous rates of splitting. Within the rapidly speciated genusNotropis, rates of chromosomal evolution appear slower relative to other, less rapidly speciated confamilial genera. Species ofNotropisalso are less divergent chromosomally, on the average, than are species from other cyprinid genera. These results are in compatible with a rectangular mode of chromosomal divergence these fishes. The results also reveal inconsistencies with a gradual mode chromosomal divergence, but at present this hypothesis cannot be falsified. Consideration of these and other data suggests that different levels of the cyprinid genome may follow independent evolutionary paths.