The scientists also determined how closely each of the 22 species is related to the others by comparing the molecular sequences that make up each of the two genes and then determining which are most similar. "We found that the closest relative of the Jamaican terrestrial crabs is a Jamaican marine crab," Hedges says.
"Jamaican land crabs look and act very different from Jamaican marine crabs, yet they have been evolving separately for the same amount of time as the marine crabs we used for our calibration on either side of Panama, which have remained almost identical," Hedges says. "Such rapid adaptation to a new ecological niche and rapid radiation of new species is not common in nature, but it apparently has occurred much more quickly than we had thought possible in these Jamaican terrestrial crabs."
This research was sponsored by the German Science Foundation and the U. S. National Science Foundation.
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
S. Blair Hedges, Penn State, telephone (+) 814-865-9991, e-mail SBH1@psu.edu
or
Christoph D. Schubart, University of Southwestern Louisiana, telephone (+)
318-482-5304 or (+) 318-482-6748, fax (+) 318-482-5834, e-mail CDS5356@usl.edu
FOR ASSISTANCE:
Barbara K. Kennedy, Penn State, telephone (+) 814-863-4682, e-mail
SCIENCE@psu.edu
FOR PHOTOS:
A photo of a Jamaican bromeliad crab sitting on a bromeliad leaf is available on
the World Wide Web at http://www.bio.psu.edu/faculty/hedges/news/news97p.htm
Slides are available by contacting Barbara K. Kennedy, Penn State, telephone (+)
814-863-4682, e-mail
Contact: Barbara K. Kennedy
science@psu.edu
814-863-4682
Penn State
27-May-1998