Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Integrating, Developing, And Testing Methods To Generate More Cohesive Approaches To Biogeographic Inference, Mallory Elizabeth Eckstut

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

As a fundamental component of the developing discipline of conservation biogeography, broadscale analyses of biotic assembly and disassembly across multiple temporal and spatial scales provide an enhanced understanding of how geologic transformations and climate oscillations have shaped extant patterns of biodiversity. As with any scientific field, there are limitations in the case of biogeographic historical reconstructions. Historical reconstructions are only as robust as the theoretical underpinnings of the methods of reconstruction (including data collection, quality, analysis, and interpretation). Nevertheless, historical reconstructions of species distributions can help inform our understanding of how species respond to environmental change.

My dissertation takes a …

Historical Diversification Of Montane Herpetofauna Within And Between The Sierras Of Mexico, Robert William Bryson Jr.

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The Mexican highlands consist of four major mountain ranges spanning most of mainland Mexico. The evolutionary history of the Mexican highlands has been shaped by various geological and climatic events over the past several million years. The relative impacts of these historical events on diversification in montane taxa, however, remains uncertain. I used mitochondrial DNA data from three widely distributed species complexes of lizards as a model system to exemplify the potential roles of Neogene mountain formation and Quaternary climate change on timing and tempo of diversification across the Mexican highlands. My results suggested strong geographic partitioning of genetic variation …