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Parallel evolutionary trajectories underlie the origin of giant suspension-feeding whales and bony fishes - PubMed

  • ️Sun Jan 01 2012

Comparative Study

. 2012 Mar 7;279(1730):944-51.

doi: 10.1098/rspb.2011.1381. Epub 2011 Aug 17.

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Comparative Study

Parallel evolutionary trajectories underlie the origin of giant suspension-feeding whales and bony fishes

Matt Friedman. Proc Biol Sci. 2012.

Abstract

Giant suspension feeders such as mysticete whales, basking and whale sharks, and the extinct (indicated by '†') †pachycormiform teleosts are conspicuous members of modern and fossil marine vertebrate faunas. Whether convergent anatomical features common to these clades arose along similar evolutionary pathways has remained unclear because of a lack of information surrounding the origins of all groups of large-bodied suspension feeders apart from baleen whales. New investigation reveals that the enigmatic ray-finned fish †Ohmdenia, from the Lower Jurassic (Toarcian, 183.0-175.6 Ma) Posidonia Shale Lagerstätte, represents the immediate sister group of edentulous †pachycormiforms, the longest lived radiation of large vertebrate suspension feeders. †Ohmdenia bisects the long morphological branch leading to suspension-feeding †pachycormiforms, providing information on the sequence of anatomical transformations preceding this major ecological shift that can be compared to changes associated with the origin of modern mysticetes. Similarities include initial modifications to jaw geometry associated with the reduction of dentition, followed by the loss of teeth. The evolution of largest body sizes within both radiations occurs only after the apparent onset of microphagy. Comparing the fit of contrasting evolutionary models to functionally relevant morphological measurements for whales and †pachycormiform fishes reveals strong support for a common adaptive peak shared by suspension-feeding members of both clades.

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Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.

†Ohmdenia multidentata, holotype, GPIT 1017/1, Lower Jurassic (Lower Toarcian), Posidonia Shale, Germany. (a) Specimen photograph. (b) Interpretive drawing. (c) Reconstruction. Belemnites associated with abdominal region are shaded in grey and marked with an asterisk (‘*’) in (b). a.f, anal fin; ang, angular; c.f, caudal fin; cle, cleithrum; den, dentary; ?epb, possible epibranchials; hym, hyomandibular; ipb, infrapharyngobranchial; max, maxilla; op, opercle; p.f, pectoral fin; pop, preopercle; qu, quadrate; rad, pectoral radial; sang, surangular; scl, supracleithra; sclr, sclerotic ring.

Figure 2.
Figure 2.

(a) Stratigraphically calibrated cladogram illustrating †pachycormiform interrelationships, based on maximum parsimony and Bayesian analysis of morphological data. Numbers to the left of nodes represent, from top to bottom: Bremer decay index; bootstrap support; Bayesian clade credibility. ‘-’ indicates bootstrap percentage or Bayesian clade credibility <50. Additional statistics for maximum parsimony solution: tree length, 223; consistency index, 0.55; rescaled consistency index, 0.42; retention index, 0.77. Crown teleost, holostean and stem neopterygian outgroups not shown. Complete tree and character optimizations are given in electronic supplementary material, figure S1. (b) Congruent series of transformations in mandibular structure in mysticetes (left) and †pachycormiforms (right). For each cladogram, internode i corresponds to decreased jaw-closing mechanical advantage, change in mandibular aspect ratio, and reduction of tooth crown height, while internode ii corresponds to the loss of dentition. Evolution of the largest body sizes in both groups occurs within the clade subtended by internode ii. Taxa, from top to bottom, are: †Basilosaurus, †Aetiocetus, †Parietobalaena (cetaceans), and †Pachycormus, †Ohmdenia, †Martillichthys (†pachycormiforms). (c) Phylomorphospace for †pachycormiforms (red) and whales (blue), based on principal coordinates analysis (PCO) of anatomical features related to suspension feeding [1,7]. Large hollow triangles represent †Ohmdenia and †aetiocetids; large hollow circles represent suspension-feeding †pachycormiforms and mysticete whales. Parenthetical values in axis labels refer to the estimated percentage of overall variance explained by that coordinate axis.

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