BUSCADOR RECOLECTA

Madagascar has become a model region for testing hypotheses of species diversification and biogeography, and many studies have focused on its diverse and highly endemic herpetofauna. Here we combine species distribution models of a near-complete set of species of reptiles and amphibians known from the island with body size data and a tabulation of herpetofaunal communities from field surveys, compiled up to 2008. Though taxonomic revisions and novel distributional records arose since compilation, we are confident that the data are appropriate for inferring and comparing biogeographic patterns among these groups of organisms. We observed species richness of both amphibians and reptiles was highest in the humid rainforest biome of eastern Madagascar, but reptiles also show areas of high richness in the dry and subarid western biomes. In several amphibian subclades, especially within the Mantellidae, species richness peaks in the central eastern geographic regions while in reptiles different subclades differ distinctly in their richness centers. A high proportion of clades and subclades of both amphibians and reptiles have a peak of local endemism in the topographically and bioclimatically diverse northern geographic regions. This northern area is roughly delimited by a diagonal spanning from 15.5°S on the east coast to ca. 15.0°S on the west coast. Amphibian diversity is highest at altitudes between 800–1200 m above sea-level whereas reptiles have their highest richness at low elevations, probably reflecting the comparatively large number of species specialized to the extended low-elevation areas in the dry and subarid biomes. We found that the range sizes of both amphibians and reptiles strongly correlated with body size, and differences between the two groups are explained by the larger body sizes of reptiles. However, snakes have larger range sizes than lizards which cannot be readily explained by their larger body sizes alone. Range filling, i.e., the amount of suitable habitat occupied by a species, is less expressed in amphibians than in reptiles, possibly reflecting their lower dispersal capacity. Taxonomic composition of communities assessed by field surveys is largely explained by bioclimatic regions, with communities from the dry and especially subarid biomes distinctly differing from humid and subhumid biomes., Fieldwork was supported by Spanish Government grants CGL2009-10198 and CGL2013-40924-P to DRV., Peer reviewed

The Rhombophryne serratopalpebrosa (Guibé 1975) species complex consists of numerous cryptic narrow-mouthed frogs (Microhylidae) mostly restricted to northern Madagascar. We here provide an updated phylogeny of the genus Rhombophryne, and formally define the R. serratopalpebrosa group, characterized by the possession of small, fleshy superciliary spines. We describe two new species belonging to this group from the Tsaratanana Massif in northern Madagascar: Rhombophryne ornata sp. nov. and R. tany sp. nov. Both of the new species have fewer superciliary spines above each eye than any other member of the group (2 vs. 3–4). Rhombophryne ornata sp. nov. is unusual in having fairly elaborate dorsal markings, and is unique in having reddish thighs. In contrast, R. tany sp. nov. is a truly cryptic species characterized by a combination of characters unique within the R. serratopalpebrosa group. Micro-CT scans revealed differences between the skeletons of these species and other members of the group: the pubis is unossified in both species, and R. ornata sp. nov. lacks ossification in the epiphyses of its limb bones and in many of its small bones. We give a full osteological description of these frog species to facilitate ongoing research concerning this group. Genetic data suggest that these two syntopic species might be sister to each other, but they show a substantial genetic divergence of 3.9% and 8.4% uncorrected pairwise distance in the mitochondrial 16S rRNA and cytochrome oxidase subunit I genes, respectively. As these species have a limited extent of occurrence, and are known only from a single location in a forest that is declining in quality, we propose they be listed as Vulnerable B1ab(iii) on the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List., The Tsaratanana work was partly funded by project CGL2013-40924-P to DRV., Peer reviewed

Supplementary Figures showing results for every Ancestral State Reconstruction analysis performed for discrete and continuous characters, This work was supported by the grant CGL2013-40924-P to David Vieites from the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad, and a FPU predoctoral fellowship from the Ministerio de Educación to Raquel Ponti, No

We sequenced the complete mitogenome of the Pyrenean frog Rana pyrenaica, which was determined from an Illumina Hi-seq RNAseq run (Illumina Inc., San Diego, CA). The genome is 17,213 bp in size, including 13 protein-coding genes, 21 transfer RNAs, two ribosomal RNAs and a control region. It shows the typical gene order of previously available frog mitogenomes, although it lacks the tRNAPhe. This is the first complete mitogenome described for a Western Palearctic brown frog species., This work was supported by the Spanish OAPN- Ministry of Environment
under Grant 206/2010; and the Spanish Ministry of Economy under Grant CGL2013-40924-P, Peer Reviewed

The Tsaratanana Massif is the highest mountain massif of Madagascar and is characterized by a high species-level endemism of its biota. Here we describe two new small-sized species of leaf-tailed geckos of the Uroplatus ebenaui group from this region. Named in a preliminary way as confirmed candidate species Uroplatus ebenaui [Ca1] and [Ca2] in previous studies, we here provide detailed data on their molecular and morphological differentiation and describe them as Uroplatus fotsivava sp. nov. and Uroplatus kelirambo sp. nov. Their closest relatives are U. fiera and U. finiavana, respectively, as revealed by a phylogeny based on DNA sequences of four mitochondrial genes. However, integration of various lines of evidence confirms that the new species are independent evolutionary lineages, differing from other Uroplatus by high mitochondrial divergences, lack of haplotype sharing in the nuclear CMOS gene, and shape and relative size of the tail. While U. fotsivava is known from multiple sites at elevations between 1100–1538 m above sea level, U. kelirambo was found only at high elevations between 2000–2200 m a.s.l.; it therefore is the only known forest-dwelling nocturnal gecko reaching such high elevations in Madagascar, and might be narrowly endemic to montane forests of the Tsaratanana Massif., Financial support was provided by the Volkswagen Foundation to PSG, FMR, FG and MV, and to FMR by Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo. The Tsaratanana work was partly funded by project CGL2013-40924-P to DRV. Expedition Angano (2015/16) was funded by the Scientific Exploration Society, Zoological Society of London, Royal Geographical Society, Cadogan Tate, and crowdfunding., Peer Reviewed

The evolution of migration in birds and its causes are still subject of debate. Recent studies tracking current bird migration have identified peaks in net primary productivity (NPP) as a main driver of bird migratory behaviour. However, it is unclear which variables may have played a major role in the evolution of bird migration at deeper phylogenetic levels. Here, we used phylogenetic comparative methods to assess whether the evolutionary patterns of migratory distances, as a proxy for migratory behaviour, are correlated with several biometric, climatic and productivity variables in a phylogenetic context, using Sylvia warblers as a case study. Our results recover NPP in the breeding range and during the breeding season as the variable with stronger positive correlation with migratory distances, being always included in the best models considering all potential variables. Several climatic variables show a correlation with the evolution of migration, but those are also tightly correlated with NPP. Among morphological variables, migratory lineages tend to have longer wings than sedentary ones. Although NPP has been identified as a driver of migratory behaviour in current species, in a phylogenetic scale it is not possible to disentangle if it was a main driver in the evolution of bird migratory behaviour or a consequence of it, yet migration and NPP seem to be tightly related today and along the long evolutionary history of these passerines., This study was partly funded by the grant CGL2013‐40924‐P of the Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Competitividad to DRV. RP was supported by FPU predoctoral fellowship from the Spanish Ministry of Education. XF was supported by a partial funding from the Fundació Barcelona Zoo.

Our current understanding of how species have evolved is mainly based on comparative phylogenetic methods, which use phylogenies to infer the evolution of traits. The development of ancestral state reconstruction (ASR) methods has provided the tools to reconstruct trait evolution, which are widely used in fields like evolutionary biology, macroecology and paleontology. As there are different elements involved in those analyses, with different levels of uncertainty (i.e. relating to branch length estimation, trait coding, statistical framework, taxon sampling or software), the various combinations of these elements likely have a strong impact on the reconstruction of the evolution of traits, potentially leading to opposite conclusions. To assess the impact of these different elements in ASR, we performed a set of analyses, including all possible combinations of such elements and using the evolution of migratory behavior in Sylvia warblers as a case study, which was coded as a continuous or as a discrete character. Our results show that taxon sampling, character coding, tree shape, statistical framework and software all significantly affect ASR, both individually and in combination. Not all reconstructed tree nodes show discrepancies, but in the critical ones most pairwise comparisons between analyses lead to conflicting and unexpectedly antagonistic results (zero migration vs fully migratory), thus challenging interpretations of trait evolution. We propose some possible solutions to partly inform decisions, involving the method selection and the incorporation of biological or fossil evidence regarding how traits evolve, but our results demand serious rethinking about how the research community currently uses ASR., This work was supported by a grant of the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad and FEDER CGL2013-40924-P, CGL2017-89898-R (AEI/FEDER, UE), and a BiodivERsA: EC21C ERANet grant to DRV. RP was supported by an FPU predoctoral fellowship from the Spanish Ministerio de Educación.

Short Communication, Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is a popular resource used for the study of evolutionary processes in birds, especially to infer divergence times between lineages. In many cases, due to the scarcity of fossils with which to constrain the age of nodes on a phylogenetic topology, dating relies on mtDNA substitution rates that, ideally, are specific to the taxa being studied. As such values are often unavailable, many studies use fixed-rate values from other studies, such as the ‘standard molecular clock’. The validity of this universal rate across all bird lineages and for the different mtDNA loci has been questioned by multiple authors. We here performed the most comprehensive calibration of the mtDNA molecular clock in birds, with the inclusion of complete mitochondrial genomes for 622 bird species and 25 reliable fossil calibrations. The results show variation in the rates among lineages and among markers, confirming the lack of universality of the standard molecular clock. Moreover, we provide specific rates for every mtDNA marker (except D-loop) in each of the sampled avian orders, a valuable tool for molecular clock analyses in the absence of fossil calibrations., This work was supported by grants from the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad and FEDER CGL2013-40924-P, CGL2017-89898-R (AEI/FEDER, UE), and a BiodivERsA: EC21C ERANet grant to D.R.V. R.P. was supported by an FPU predoctoral fellowship from the Spanish Ministerio de Educación., Peer reviewed

Within the Malagasy endemic family of Mantellidae, the only completely sequenced mitochondrial genome (mitogenome) is that of Mantella madagascariensis. Yet, this genome has proven to be the largest among all vertebrates with 23 kbp in size, and shows a duplication of the tRNA methionine coding gene, a pseudogene of this same gene and a duplicated control region. In this study, we report the complete mitochondrial genome of Mantella baroni, the second mitogenome sequenced for the Mantellidae family. This genome sequence has been generated using next-generation sequencing technics performed on Illumina Hi-seq. The genome is 20,945 bp (21 kbp) in size with 13 protein-coding genes, 23 tRNA coding genes, 2 rRNA coding genes and 2 Control Regions (CR1 and CR2). This newly generated mitogenome shows duplication of the tRNA glycine coding gene (G1 and G2) and translocation of tRNA methionine coding gene M2 in the CR2. This gene organization is unique among anurans. Both M. baroni and M. madagascariensis mitogenomes are amongst the largest in vertebrates which might be related to their aposematism or their skin toxicity by alkaloid secretion. We also hypothesize that other Mantella species likely have large genomes, being not clear how the genome size and organization of mitochondria evolved in Malagasy frogs. Testing such a hypothesis require more mitogenome sequencing for Mantella and other representatives of the mantellid diversity. The mitogenome generated here will be useful for comparative genomic studies but also to answer the question on how mitogenomes evolved in the Mantellidae family., This research has received grants of the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (FEDER, EU), grant reference: CGL2013-40924-P, and the Agencia Española de Investigación (AEI/FEDER, EU), grant reference: CGL2017-89898-R., Peer reviewed

The scientific evidence for anthropogenic climate change is empirically settled, but communicating it to nonscientific audiences remains challenging. To be explicit about the state of knowledge on climate science, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has adopted a vocabulary that ranks climate findings through certainty-calibrated qualifiers of confidence and likelihood. In this article, we quantified the occurrence of knowns and unknowns about "The Physical Science Basis" of the IPCC's Fifth Assessment Report by counting the frequency of calibrated qualifiers. We found that the tone of the IPCC's probabilistic language is remarkably conservative (mean confidence is medium, and mean likelihood is 66%-100% or 0-33%), and emanates from the IPCC recommendations themselves, complexity of climate research, and exposure to politically motivated debates. Leveraging communication of uncertainty with overwhelming scientific consensus about anthropogenic climate change should be one element of a wider reform, whereby the creation of an IPCC outreach working group could enhance the transmission of climate science to the panel's audiences., Supported by British Ecological Society research grant no. 4496–5470 to SH-P; Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness project no. CGL2013–40924-P to DRV; and Royal Society, Psychonomic Society, and Australian Research Council discovery project no. DP160103596 to SL.