Comparative analysis of land snail radiations on Crete

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Bernhard Hausdorf
• Subject Area: Evolution and Systematics of Plants and Fungi
• Term: from 2004 to 2008
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 5423240

There are several radiations of land snail taxa on Crete which are supposed to be a result of the fragmentation of Crete into several paleoislands during the late Miocene and Pliocene. The subsequent allopatric speciation on the isolated paleoislands resulted in largely non-adaptive radiations so that the niches of most of the vicariating species hardly differ. This vicariance model predicts that there will be non-random congruence of the distribution areas of species originating on the same paleoisland. Therefore, we will investigate this model by testing whether the distribution areas of the land snail species show non-random congruence. Furthermore, the phylogenies of the radiations might reflect the fragmentation of the paleoislands, if these where separated in an ordered sequence. Thus, we will check in how far the phylogenies of the radiations resemble each other concerning the geographical distribution of the species and indicate the history of the islands and in how far they indicate dispersal events. Supplementary to the available information on other taxa, the systematics and the phylogeny of the endemic radiations of xerophilous hygromiids shall be studied.

• DFG Programme: Priority Programmes
• Subproject of: SPP 1127: Radiations - Origins of Biological Diversity