South American palaeobotany and the origins of neotropical rainforests

Burnham, Robyn J.; Johnson, Kirk R.

doi:10.1098/rstb.2004.1531

Cited by 248 publications

(197 citation statements)

References 85 publications

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“…This paper, and the others in this volume (e.g. Crisp et al 2004;Pennington & Dick 2004;Plana 2004;Burnham & Johnson 2004;Jacobs 2004) use biome in a geographically restricted sense (sub-biomes and eccoregions as defined above), which allows better incorporation of phylogenetic and taxonomic information.…”

Section: What Is a Biome?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the cases of Africa (Jacobs 2004), the Neotropics (Burnham & Johnson 2004) and Australia (Hill 2004), there are palaeontological reviews. These are essential for two reasons.…”

Section: Studies Of Individual Biomesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Burnham & Johnson (2004) review palaeontological data that show no clear evidence in terms of morphological features and taxonomic composition for rainforest in South America until the early Tertiary. At this time, South America was an island continent, and had been isolated since it split from Africa ca.…”

Section: Studies Of Individual Biomesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Introduction and synthesis: plant phylogeny and the origin of major biomes

Pennington

Cronk

Richardson³

2004

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B

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Phylogenetic trees based upon DNA sequence data, when calibrated with a dimension of time, allow inference of: (i) the pattern of accumulation of lineages through time; (ii) the time of origin of monophyletic groups; (iii) when lineages arrived in different geographical areas; (iv) the time of origin of biome-specific morphologies. This gives a powerful new view of the history of biomes that in many cases is not provided by the incomplete plant fossil record. Dated plant phylogenies for angiosperm families such as Leguminosae (Fabaceae), Melastomataceae sensu stricto, Annonaceae and Rhamnaceae indicate that long-distance, transoceanic dispersal has played an important role in shaping their distributions, and that this can obscure any effect of tectonic history, previously assumed to have been the major cause of their biogeographic patterns. Dispersal from other continents has also been i mportant in the assembly of the Amazonian rainforest flora and the Australian flora. Comparison of dated biogeographic patterns of plants and animals suggests that recent long-distance dispersal might be more prevalent in plants, which has major implications for community assembly and coevolution. Dated plant phylogenies also reveal the role of past environmental changes on the evolution of lineages in species-rich biomes, and show that recent Plio-Pleistocene diversification has contributed substantially to their current species richness. Because of the critical role of fossils and morphological characters in assigning ages to nodes in phylogenetic trees, future studies must include careful morphological consideration of fossils and their extant relatives in a phylogenetic context. Ideal study systems will be based upon DNA sequence data from multiple loci and multiple fossil calibrations. This allows cross-validation both of age estimates from different loci, and from different fossil calibrations. For a more complete view of biome history, future studies should emphasize full taxon sampling in ecologically important groups, and should focus on geographical areas for which few species-level phylogenies are available, such as tropical Africa and Asia. These studies are urgent because understanding the history of biomes can both inform conservation decisions, and help predict the effects of future environmental changes at a time when biodiversity is being impacted on an unprecedented scale.

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Section: What Is a Biome?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the cases of Africa (Jacobs 2004), the Neotropics (Burnham & Johnson 2004) and Australia (Hill 2004), there are palaeontological reviews. These are essential for two reasons.…”

Section: Studies Of Individual Biomesmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Introduction and synthesis: plant phylogeny and the origin of major biomes

Pennington

Cronk

Richardson³

2004

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B

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“…Standard global climate models that are widely used by the climate science community are modified only in that non-angiosperm physiology is substituted globally for that of the angiosperms while maintaining modern vegetative biomass. The environmental impact of angiosperms would have been first felt in the Cretaceous, albeit with extensively debated timing, geography and ecology (Morley 2000;Ziegler et al 2003;Burnham & Johnson 2004;Jaramillo et al 2006). Although modelling of the effect of angiosperm evolution on Cretaceous climates is ongoing, the emphasis here is not on the specific climate regime in which they originated but on determining the significance of their elevated transpirational capacities for climate in general.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

An exceptional role for flowering plant physiology in the expansion of tropical rainforests and biodiversity

Boyce

Lee

2010

Proc. R. Soc. B.

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Movement of water from soil to atmosphere by plant transpiration can feed precipitation, but is limited by the hydraulic capacities of plants, which have not been uniform through time. The flowering plants that dominate modern vegetation possess transpiration capacities that are dramatically higher than any other plants, living or extinct. Transpiration operates at the level of the leaf, however, and how the impact of this physiological revolution scales up to the landscape and larger environment remains unclear. Here, climate modelling demonstrates that angiosperms help ensure aseasonally high levels of precipitation in the modern tropics. Most strikingly, replacement of angiosperm with non-angiosperm vegetation would result in a hotter, drier and more seasonal Amazon basin, decreasing the overall area of ever-wet rainforest by 80 per cent. Thus, flowering plant ecological dominance has strongly altered climate and the global hydrological cycle. Because tropical biodiversity is closely tied to precipitation and rainforest area, angiosperm climate modification may have promoted diversification of the angiosperms themselves, as well as radiations of diverse vertebrate and invertebrate animal lineages and of epiphytic plants. Their exceptional potential for environmental modification may have contributed to divergent responses to similar climates and global perturbations, like mass extinctions, before and after angiosperm evolution.

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“…1 in USA, ca $350 million per year) and Mexico (world's top producer) (43,44,130,133). Other members of the Lauraceae, which are keystone species in tropical American ecosystems (21,29,35), may be at risk. LW is caused by Raffaelea lauricola (51,65), which has an Asian ambrosia beetle vector, Xyleborus glabratus (Scolytinae: Xyleborini) ( (Fig.…”

Section: Ambrosia Beetle-associated Diseasesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Destructive Tree Diseases Associated with Ambrosia and Bark Beetles: Black Swan Events in Tree Pathology?

et al. 2013

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Diseases that are associated with ambrosia and bark beetles comprise some of the most significant problems that have emerged on trees in the last century. They are caused by fungi in the Ophiostomatales, Microascales and Hypocreales, and have vectors in the Scolytinae (ambrosia and bark beetles), Platypodinae (ambrosia beetles) and Hylesininae (bark beetles) subfamilies of the Curculionidae (Coleoptera) (73,102,144). Some of these problems, such as Dutch elm disease (DED), have a long history, have been extensively researched, and are fairly well understood (23,56,70,113,149,168,169). In contrast, other similar diseases developed recently and are poorly or partially understood (2,3,42,51,73,89,94,98,114,127,137,154,158, 164,165). Significant data gaps may exist for the ecology, epidemiology and management of the latter diseases.The emergence and unexpected importance of these tree diseases are discussed in thisarticle. An underlying factor in most of these interactions is the absence of a coevolved history between the so-called "naïve" or "new encounter" host trees and the pathogens and/or beetles (27,128,174). For the ambrosia beetles, these interactions are associated with susceptibility to what are typically benign fungi and atypical relationships with healthy trees (ambrosia beetles favor trees that are dead or stressed). Interestingly, the pathogens for both the ambrosia and bark beetle-associated diseases often have symbiotic relationships with the insects that are not based on phytopathogenicity. Some of the most alarming and damaging of these diseases are considered below as "black swan events" (155).Black Swans. Before 1697, improbable events and situations in Europe were known as "black swans" (at the time, all swans known to Europeans were white) (134). In that year, the black swan, Cygnus atratus, was discovered in Western Australia (38). Thereafter, "black swan" developed as a metaphor for a supposed impossibility that is contradicted with new information.For example, John Stuart Mill used black swan logical fallacy when identifying falsification, a key component in the scientific method (68).In a recent book, Taleb (155) developed Black Swan Theory (BST). Unlike the "black swan" to which Mill referred (68), BST focuses on unexpected events of large magnitude and consequence (155). Taleb (155) recognized such events in diverse fields including finance, history, science and technology. He suggested that black swan events: 1) have extreme impacts; 2) lie outside the realm of regular expectations (they are rare); and 3) are unpredictable.Although all ambrosia and bark beetle-associated diseases are not black swan events, several do fulfill the above criteria since they have large impacts, are uncommon surprises and are unpredictable (2,3,51,56,73,89,94,98,114,137,154,158, 164,165) (Table 1). They are typically understood and appreciated only with the benefit of hindsight and subsequent research.The Beetles and Beetle-associated Tree Diseases. The order Coleoptera contains more species than any other or...

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South American palaeobotany and the origins of neotropical rainforests

Cited by 248 publications

References 85 publications

Introduction and synthesis: plant phylogeny and the origin of major biomes

Introduction and synthesis: plant phylogeny and the origin of major biomes

An exceptional role for flowering plant physiology in the expansion of tropical rainforests and biodiversity

Destructive Tree Diseases Associated with Ambrosia and Bark Beetles: Black Swan Events in Tree Pathology?

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