Scribd
Upload
82 views33 pages

Species and Speciation

This document discusses various concepts relating to speciation and species. It defines microevolution and macroevolution, and describes different modes of speciation such as cladogenesis, anagenesis, allopatric, peripatric, parapatric, and sympatric speciation. It also discusses different species concepts, barriers to gene flow, prezygotic and postzygotic isolating mechanisms, and provides examples of character displacement and genetic models of speciation. Speciation is described as the process by which evolution advances through the production of new gene complexes capable of ecological shifts.

Uploaded by

Soumyajit Das
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
82 views33 pages

Species and Speciation

This document discusses various concepts relating to speciation and species. It defines microevolution and macroevolution, and describes different modes of speciation such as cladogenesis, anagenesis, allopatric, peripatric, parapatric, and sympatric speciation. It also discusses different species concepts, barriers to gene flow, prezygotic and postzygotic isolating mechanisms, and provides examples of character displacement and genetic models of speciation. Speciation is described as the process by which evolution advances through the production of new gene complexes capable of ecological shifts.

Uploaded by

Soumyajit Das
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 33

Species and Speciation

Microevolution evolutionary processes within species

Macroevolution evolutionary processes at or above the species


level
the distinction is irreversible but the processes are the same
Cladogenesis splitting of one lineage into two or more

Anagenesis morphological change in a single lineage through time


resulting in diagnosably distinct chronospecies

species may be the only biologically natural


taxonomic unit
Speciation, the production of new gene
complexes capable of ecological shifts, is the
method by which evolution advances. Without
speciation, there would be no diversification of
the organic world, no adaptive radiation, and very
little evolutionary progress. The species, then, is
the keystone of evolution - Ernst Mayr

Phyletic Gradualism versus Punctuated Equilibrium

stasis

speciation
stasis

Punctuated equilibrium asserts that the only significant


evolutionary changes that occur are the result of speciation

Punctuated Equilibrium after Eldredge and Gould

stasis

Phyletic Gradualism after Gingerich

Species Concepts
If species are the only biologically-real taxonomic unit, then why are
species so difficult to define?
1) differences in reproductive mechanisms among taxonomic
groups
2) philosophy
3) speciation is a process that may not be complete

ring species California salamander


(Ensatina escholtzii)

Biological Species Concept


a species is a group of individuals fully fertile inter se, but
barred from interbreeding with other similar groups by its
physiological properties (Dobzansky 1935)
- species are groups of actually or potentially interbreeding
populations that are reproductively isolated from other such
groups (Mayr 1942)

Evolutionary Species Concept


a species is a single lineage (an ancestral-descendant
sequence) of populations of organisms that maintains its
identity from other such lineages and which has its own
evolutionary tendencies and historical fate (Wiley 1978)

Phylogenetic Species Concept


a phylogenetic species is an irreducible (basal) cluster of
organisms that is diagnosably distinct from other such
clusters, and within which there is a parental pattern of
ancestry and descent (Cracraft 1989)

phylogenetic species - monophyletic

biological species - paraphyletic

e
Reproductive
isolation

The problem with speciation is how two


different populations can be formed without
intermediates?

Geographic Modes of Speciation

Snapping shrimp - allopatric speciation

Tanisyptera kingfishers - peripatric speciation

California salamander (Ensatina escholtzii) Parapatric speciation

Apple maggot fly (Rhagoletis pomonella)


Sympatric speciation

Genetic models of speciation


(not mutually exclusive of geographic models)
Natural Selection
Sexual Selection
Drift
Transilience
Cytoplasmically Induced or Endosymbiotic Incompatibility

Cytoplasmic Incompatibility
Wolbachia a vertically transmitted (i.e., by females) cytoplasmic
Rickettsial endoparasite/endosymbiont
Present in most if not all orders of insects (and others)
Rapidly becomes widespread in populations by excluding males
1)Feminization of males
2)Female parthenogenesis
3)Male lethality

Promotes reproductive isolation of


populations by Cytoplasmic Incompatibility
(infected sperm lethal to uninfected eggs or
eggs infected with different strain)
e.g., Nasonia - parasitoid wasp and
endosymbiont Wolbachia induced
Cytoplasmic Incompatibility

Genetic models of speciation


Potentially Instantaneous Speciation
Autopolyploids (4N of one parental species)
e.g., four-wing saltbush (Atriplex canescens)

Genetic models of speciation


Potentially Instantaneous Speciation
Hybrid Species
Homoploids (diploid)

X
House Sparrow
(Passer domesticus)

=
Spanish Sparrow
(P. hispaniolensis)

Italian Sparrow
(Passer italiae)

(more ) Homoploids

X
Coyote (Canis latrans)

Gray Wolf (Canis lupus)

Red Wolf
(Canis rufus)

Genetic models of speciation


Potentially Instantaneous Speciation
Hybrid Species
Allopolyploids (4N or more)

reversed chirality in hybrid snails (Partula spp.)

Allopolyploids

X
Pool Frog
(Rana ridibunda)

=
Marsh Frog
(Rana lessonae)

Edible Frog
(Rana esculenta)
2N, 3N, or 4N all-female species

Genetic models of speciation


Potentially Instantaneous Speciation
Hybrid Species
Allopolyploids (4N or more, some secondarily homoploids)

Polyploidy, often referred to in the genomics literature as wholegenome duplication (WGD), has played a dramatic role in the
diversification of most, if not all, eukaryotic lineages, perhaps most
impressively within the angiosperms (Soltis et al 2009 Am J Bot 96
336-348).

Angiosperms
An estimated 30 to 80% of angiosperms are of hybrid origin

The world is not a formless mass of randomly combining genes and


traits, but a great array of gene combinations which are clustered on a
large but finite number of adaptive peaks. The gene combinations
whose adaptive value has been vouchsafed by natural selection must
be protected from disintegration by barriers to gene exchange,
termed isolating mechanisms (Theodosius Dobzansky)

Barriers to Gene Flow (either during speciation or


upon Secondary Contact)
Prezygotic isolating mechanisms anything that
prevents hybrid or inter-populational
fertilization
Postzygotic isolating mechanisms (secondary
contact only) anything that diminishes hybrid
(zygote or organism) fitness

Prezygotic isolating mechanisms


Habitat, spatial, or host

Temporal or phenological

Behavioral

Mechanical
genitalia of male damselflies

Gametic inviability or incompatibility

character displacement any trait with greater


interspecific phenotypic difference in sympatry than
in allopatry, often a prezygotic isolating mechanism

measurement of trait

allopatry

sympatry

Species A

allopatry

species B

geographic transect

Character Displacement
in song of African Pogoniulus
tinkerbirds

Kirschel et al. PNAS 2009;106:8256-8261

in coloration of dewlaps in
Haitian Anolis lizards

www.anoleannals.org

Postzygotic isolating mechanisms


Hybrid zygote death or inviability
Hybrid sterility

Reduced hybrid fitness

Haldanes Rule in hybrids, the heterogametic sex is more


likely to be absent, rare, or sterile than the homogametic sex

Definitions
Polytypic species a species with recognizably different
populations
Subspecies a recognizably distinct population (a matter of
degree)

Semispecies hybridizing species


Superspecies a collection of semispecies

Sibling species sister species


Cryptic species unrecognizably (to humans) distinct species
Chronospecies recognizably distinct populations of a single
lineage separated in time

You might also like