Short-term paleogeographic reorganizations and climate events shaped diversification of North American freshwater gastropods over deep time

Abstract

What controls species diversity and diversification is one of the major questions in evolutionary biology and paleontology. Previous studies have addressed this issue based on various plant and animal groups, geographic regions, and time intervals. However, as most previous research focused on terrestrial or marine ecosystems, our understanding of the controls on diversification of biota (and particularly invertebrates) in freshwater environments in deep time is still limited. Here, we infer diversification rates of North American freshwater gastropods from the Late Triassic to the Pleistocene and explore potential links between shifts in speciation and extinction and major changes in paleogeography, climate, and biotic interactions. We found that variation in the speciation rate is best explained by changes in continental fragmentation, with rate shifts coinciding with major paleogeographic reorganizations in the Mesozoic, in particular the retreat of the Sundance Sea and subsequent development of the Bighorn wetland and the advance of the Western Interior Seaway. Climatic events in the Cenozoic (Middle Eocene Climate Optimum, Miocene Climate Optimum) variably coincide with shifts in speciation and extinction as well, but no significant long-term association could be detected. Similarly, no influence of diversity dependence was found across the entire time frame of ~ 214 Myr. Our results indicate that short-term climatic events and paleogeographic changes are relevant to the diversification of continental freshwater biota, while long-term trends have limited effect.

Fifth mass extinction event triggered the diversification of the largest family of freshwater gastropods (Caenogastropoda: Truncatelloidea: Hydrobiidae)

“…Our molecular data evidence the emergence of fast‐diversifying clades in the Miocene (e.g. Pseudamnicolinae, Nymphophilinae and Caspiinae), resulting in an accelerated lineage accumulation of hydrobiids that is consistent with the diversification rates inferred for Palaearctic and Nearctic gastropod species based on fossil data (Neubauer et al., 2015, 2021, 2022a). This has been attributed to intense topographic isolations, paleoclimatic change and the evolution of several long‐lived lake systems (in the Palaearctic) during the last 20 Myr, leading to highly diverse faunas (Neubauer et al., 2022a, 2022b).…”

The fossil record of freshwater Gastropoda – a global review

“…Data derived from two sources. A large part is provided by the species occurrences collected in the course of recent publications (Neubauer et al ., 2015 b , c , 2021, 2022 a , b ), representing the most complete occurrence data sets for Europe and North America for the Mesozoic and Cenozoic. For all other species, data on taxonomy, distribution and fossil ages were gathered from the literature (original descriptions and revisions) and made available online via MolluscaBase (MolluscaBase eds, 2023).…”

“…Asia follows with 1268 species, reflecting the diverse Mesozoic and Cenozoic lake systems particularly in China, Siberia, and Mongolia (Martinson, 1961(Martinson, , 1982Pan, 1977;Youluo, 1978;Kolesnikov, 1980), compared to a relatively poor record in tropical Asia. The North American fossil record yielded 507 species, mainly from the west to mid-west USA and southern Canada (Henderson, 1935;Neubauer et al, 2022a). The continents of the southern hemisphere are comparatively poor in fossil freshwater gastropods (Fig.…”

“…Other continents harboured fewer of these sedimentary archives, e.g. the Pebas wetland (Wesselingh, 2006 a , 2007), Lake T'oo'dichi' in North America (Turner & Fishman, 1991; Neubauer et al ., 2022 a ), Lake Nanning in China (Ying et al ., 2018), and Lake Turkana in eastern Africa (Wesselingh, 2007; Van Bocxlaer, Van Damme & Feibel, 2008). In contrast to lakes, rivers have a comparatively poor preservation potential due to their high hydrodynamic energy (Holland, 2016) resulting in the fragmentation, abrasion, disarticulation or complete obliteration of freshwater mollusc shells (Nielsen, Helama & Nielsen, 2008).…”

“…Rabosky, 2013; Silvestro et al ., 2015; Ezard & Purvis, 2016; Jezkova & Wiens, 2017; Lehtonen et al ., 2017; Bush & Payne, 2021; Rabosky & Benson, 2021; Neubauer et al ., 2022 b ). The diversification history of freshwater gastropods is linked to tectonics, continental palaeogeography, and large‐scale climatic developments, which control the availability and persistence of freshwater ecosystems across space and time (Neubauer et al ., 2015 b , c , 2022 a , b ; Neubauer & Harzhauser, 2022).…”