ArticlePloS one2014
Cytochrome b divergence between avian sister species is linked to generation length and body mass.
Article in PloS one, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 6 papers.
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Who cites it
6 citing papers in PubMed.
- Comparative Genomic and Mitochondrial Phylogenetic Relationships of Ovulidae (Mollusca: Gastropoda) Along the Chinese Coast.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Genetic Diversity Analysis of MitochondrialLife (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Article
- Article
- Article
- Correlates of rate heterogeneity in avian ecomorphological traits.Ecology letters · 2018Article
- Rearrangement and evolution of mitochondrial genomes in parrots.Molecular phylogenetics and evolution · 2016Article
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
It is increasingly realised that the molecular clock does not tick at a constant rate. Rather, mitochondrial mutation rates are influenced by factors such as generation length and body mass. This has implications for the use of genetic data in species delimitation. It could be that speciation, as recognised by avian taxonomists, is associated with a certain minimum genetic distance between sister taxa, in which case we would predict no difference in the cytochrome b divergence of sister taxa according to the species' body size or generation time. Alternatively, if what taxonomists recognise as speciation has tended to be associated with the passage of a minimum amount of time since divergence, then there might be less genetic divergence between sister taxa with slower mutation rates, namely those that are heavier and/or with longer generation times. After excluding non-flying species, we analysed a database of over 600 avian sister species pairs, and found that species pairs with longer generation lengths (which tend to be the larger species) showed less cytochrome b divergence. This finding cautions against using any simple unitary criterion of genetic divergence to delimit species.
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