Abstract:
:Species response to environmental change may vary from adaptation to the new conditions, to dispersal towards territories with better ecological settings (known as habitat tracking), and to extinction. A phylogenetically explicit analysis of habitat tracking in Caenozoic large mammals shows that species moving over longer distances during their existence survived longer. By partitioning the fossil record into equal time intervals, we showed that the longest distance was preferentially covered just before extinction. This supports the idea that habitat tracking is a key reaction to environmental change, and confirms that tracking causally prolongs species survival. Species covering longer distances also have morphologically less variable cheek teeth. Given the tight relationship between cheek teeth form and habitat selection in large mammals, this supports the well-known, yet little tested, idea that habitat tracking bolsters morphological stasis.
journal_name
Biol Lettjournal_title
Biology lettersauthors
Raia P,Passaro F,Fulgione D,Carotenuto Fdoi
10.1098/rsbl.2011.0613subject
Has Abstractpub_date
2012-02-23 00:00:00pages
64-6issue
1eissn
1744-9561issn
1744-957Xpii
rsbl.2011.0613journal_volume
8pub_type
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