Flight of the Dodo

Abstract

The evolutionary history of the dodo is very poorly understood. Like many avian island endemics, a high degree of morphological change associated with flightlessness and gigantism has obscured phylogenetic relationships, and historically the dodo has been linked with avian tris (originally named for its dodolike beak) is the basal member of this strongly supported clade of large, generally ground-dwelling, island endemics. Furthermore, the phylogeographic distribution of this morphologically diverse clade suggests that the dodo and the sol-Two external fossil calibrations were used in separate ML molecular clock calculations after tests found no violation of clocklike behavior (3). The analyses indicate that the dodo/solitaire and Caloenas diverged in the mid/late Eocene, around 42.6 million years ago (Ma) (95% confidence interval = 31.9 to 56.1 Ma), whereas the dodo and the solitaire separated in the late Oligocene, about 25.6 Ma (17.6 to 35.9 Ma). The latter date is biogeographically interesting as it is considerably older than the islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues. Geological evidence suggests that Mauritius emerged in a series of volcanic events, the earliest of which occurred around groups ranging from the ratites to 6.8 to 7.8 Ma, whereas Rodrigues the raptors (1). Since the mid-Geopelia cuneata did not emerge until 1.5 Ma (5). 1800s, morphological studies have Phaps chalcoptera Therefore, it seems highly unlikelinked the dodo (initially Didus in-Ocyphaps lophotes ly that the large genetic distance r> ? 77 \ 31 1 i Leucosarcia melanoleuca eptus, now Raphus cucullatus) and _ Gallicolumba beccari between the dodo and the solitaire its presumed close relative the sol-Gallicolumba tristigmata resulted from isolation on the two itaire (Pezophaps solitaria) with 1-G Gallicolumba luzonica islands. Drilling projects have esthe Columbiformes (pigeons and Otidiphaps nobilis tablished that ridges surrounding Ptilinopus melanosplM doves), but their exact position is Ptilinopussuperbus th e Mascarene Plateau were unresolved and they have been 84 91 Alectroenas madagascariensis above sea level in the late Oligoplaced in many positions within the1 00 Drepanoptila holosericea cene and have subsided slowly cosmopolitan Columbidae or in 96 Ptilinopus occipitalis thereafter (5). The similarity betheir own farmily, Raphidae, out--rl |9 Ducula arinea tween the timing of the dodo/solside the Columbidae but within 100 Ducula zoeae itaire divergence and the first Columbiformes (1, 2). To answer I Goura victoria geological evidence of land in the these questions, we extracted DNA 86r Caloenas nicobarica Mascarene island chain is striking and amplified 1.4 kb of mitochon-87 91 Pezophaps solitaria and suggests that island stepping-99 ~ 98 Raphus cucullatus drial sequence [360-base pair (bp) Didunculus strigirostrls stones may have been used before 12S rRNA and 1050-bp cyto-1ITreron vernans the two species eventually found chrome b] from 37 species of pi-9 1001 y1001 Treronaustralis their way to Mauritius and Rogeons and doves, inclu...

DIVERSIFICATION OF THE SOUTH AMERICAN AVIFAUNA: PATTERNS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR CONSERVATION IN THE ANDES1

“…This tree is broadly in agreement with previous, less exhaustive phylogenetic analyses that included some members of this clade (Johnson et al 2001, Shapiro et al 2002, Pereira et al 2007); however, some important novel results emerged from our comprehensive analysis. Similarly to prior results, we estimated Claravis pretiosa as sister to the rest of the clade, with Uropelia estimated as sister to Metriopelia plus Columbina (Table 1).…”

“…Several phylogenies have indicated that this group forms a monophyletic clade, although the placement of the clade within Columbidae is still unclear. Some phylogenies have placed the small New World ground doves as sister to the rest of the family (Johnson and Clayton 2000, Johnson 2004, Johnson et al 2010, but other work has placed the group as nested within the family (Shapiro et al 2002, Pereira et al 2007, Gibb and Penny 2010. Relationships among the species within this clade, however, have yet to be addressed in detail.…”

Absence of Yersinia pestis-specific DNA in human teeth from five European excavations of putative plague victims

“…However, similar results are found by two independent laboratories, one of which is a facility dedicated to aDNA research and has published numerous replicated aDNA studies (e.g. Cooper et al, 2001;Shapiro et al, 2002;Barnes et al, 2002;Endicott et al, 2003;Gilbert et al, 2003a, b). Secondly, the lack of contaminant DNA sequence variation observed between samples from one archaeological site and the much larger sequence variation between different sites points to the presence of contaminants in samples prior to extraction.…”

Matching loci surveyed to questions asked in phylogeography

“…R. Soc. B 283: 20152340 inferences of population divergence patterns solely on mtDNA [57][58][59][60] are probably reliable. However, our experimental design based on two-population comparison is relatively simple.…”