Abstract
Current statistical biogeographical analysis methods are limited in the ways ecology can be related to the processes of diversification and geographical range evolution, requiring conflation of geography and ecology, and/or assuming ecologies that are uniform across all lineages and invariant in time. This precludes the possibility of studying a broad class of macroevolutionary biogeographical theories that relate geographical and species histories through lineage-specific ecological and evolutionary dynamics, such as taxon cycle theory. Here we present a new model that generates phylogenies under a complex of superpositioned geographical range evolution, trait evolution, and diversification processes that can communicate with each other. We present a likelihood-free method of inference under our model using discriminant analysis of principal components of summary statistics calculated on phylogenies, with the discriminant functions trained on data generated by simulations under our model. This approach of model selection by classification of empirical data with respect to data generated under training models is shown to be efficient, robust, and performs well over a broad range of parameter space defined by the relative rates of dispersal, trait evolution, and diversification processes. We apply our method to a case study of the taxon cycle, that is testing for habitat and trophic level constraints in the dispersal regimes of the Wallacean avifaunal radiation.
Highlights
Model-based historical biogeography methods have advanced remarkably in recent years, facilitating the statistical investigations of a broad range of questions that relate geographical history to the evolutionary history of lineages
While traits can be used to represent any aspect of lineages, in this discussion we find it useful to consider them as representative of lineage ecology, just as areas represent the lineage geography
geographic state speciation and extinction model (GeoSSE) (Goldberg et al 2011) does allow for more sophisticated modeling of the diversifiction process by modeling the interaction between diversification rates and geographical range evolution as noted in the introduction, to study the effect of ecology on diversification, habitats are treated as geographic areas, which conflates ecology and geography, such that the interaction of ecology on geographical range cannot be studied with the GeoSSE approach
Summary
Model-based historical biogeography methods have advanced remarkably in recent years, facilitating the statistical investigations of a broad range of questions that relate geographical history to the evolutionary history of lineages. The “Dispersal-Extinction-Cladogenesis” (DEC) model was a crucial contribution to the field, providing a rigorous probabilistic framework to model dispersal and vicariance processes informed by phylogenetic and geographical data (Ree et al 2005; Ree and Smith 2008). Under this DEC model, numerous studies into the geographical origins of groups as well as the histories of changes to the geographical ranges of lineages in those groups over time have been carried out (e.g., de Bruyn et al 2014; Loader et al 2014; Mitchell et al 2014). Studies trying relating ecological processes to phylogenetic, macro-evolutionary, and biogeographical process, or trying to understand how differences in lineage biologies and ecologies contribute to differences in biogeographic patterns, were precluded
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
