Life Sciences Commons^™

Persistence And Stability Of Eastern Afromontane Forests: Evidence From Brevicipitid Frogs, Simon P. Loader, F. Sara Ceccarelli, Michele Menegon, Kim M. Howell, Roman Kassahun, Abebe A. Mengistu, Samy A. Saber, Fikirte Gebresenbet, Rafael O. De Sá, Et Al.

Biology Faculty Publications

Aim: The persistence and stability of habitats through time are considered predictors of high levels of biodiversity in some environments. Long-term habitat persistence and stability may explain the species-rich, endemic forest fauna and flora of the Eastern Afromontane Biodiversity Region (EABR). Using comple- mentary phylogenetic and biogeographical approaches, we examine evolution- ary patterns in EAR brevicipitid frogs. Using these data, we test whether brevicipitid history reflects patterns of long-term forest persistence and/or sta bility across the EABR.

Location: East Africa.

Methods: A dated phylogeny for brevicipitids was constructed using two nuclear and three mitochondrial markers. Alternative diversification modes were used …

Evolutionary Relationships Of The Critically Endangered Frog Ericabatrachus Baleensis Largen, 1991 With Notes On Incorporating Previously Unsampled Taxa Into Large-Scale Phylogenetic Analyses, Karen Siu-Ting, David J. Gower, Davide Pisani, Roman Kassahun, Fikirte Gebresenbet, Michele Menegon, Abebe A. Mengistu, Samy A. Saber, Rafael O. De Sá, Mark Wilkinson, Simon P. Loader

Biology Faculty Publications

Background: The phylogenetic relationships of many taxa remain poorly known because of a lack of appropriate data and/or analyses. Despite substantial recent advances, amphibian phylogeny remains poorly resolved in many instances. The phylogenetic relationships of the Ethiopian endemic monotypic genus Ericabatrachus has been addressed thus far only with phenotypic data and remains contentious.

Results: We obtained fresh samples of the now rare and Critically Endangered Ericabatrachus baleensis and generated DNA sequences for two mitochondrial and four nuclear genes. Analyses of these new data using de novo and constrained-tree phylogenetic reconstructions strongly support a close relationship between Ericabatrachus and …

High Prevalence Of The Amphibian Chytrid Fungus (Batrachochytrium Dendrobatidis) Across Multiple Taxa And Localities In The Highlands Of Ethiopia, David J. Gower, Thomas M. Doherty-Bone, Roman K. Aberra, Abebe Mengistu, Silvia Schwaller, Michele Menegon, Rafael O. De Sá, Samy A. Saber, Andrew A. Cunningham, Simon P. Loader

Biology Faculty Publications

Surveys of the potentially lethal amphibian chytrid fungus (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis - Bd) in Africa are patchy, especially in some regions of high species endemicity. We present results of the first Bd surveys of wild amphibians in Ethiopia, for two upland regions on either side of the Rift Valley: the Bale Mountains and the Kaffa region. Surveys were opportunistic so that robust interpretation of the data is limited. Utilizing diagnostic qPCR assays, 51 out of 120 frogs (14 species in 10 genera) tested positive for Bd at altitudes of 1,620–3,225 m, across all genera and species, and all but …