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SUMMARY:Disparities in the evolution of multicellularity - Phil Donoghue\,
  University of Bristol
DTSTART:20150505T150000Z
DTEND:20150505T160000Z
UID:TALK57458@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Dr Jennifer Hoyal Cuthill
DESCRIPTION:Multicellularity is widely regarded as one of the most formati
 ve steps in evolutionary history and it has been made by many scions in th
 e Tree of Life\, however\, the consequences have not been equal for all of
  the lineages that have made this transition. Most attention has been lavi
 shed on attempts to understand how animal bodyplans emerged from unicellul
 ar ancestors\, apparently demonstrating not only that this was achieved ve
 ry quickly\, but that the extremes of disparity were achieved early. Causa
 l hypotheses range from protein\, gene regulatory\, and stochastic evoluti
 on. We have attempted to test these hypotheses of pattern and process by e
 stablishing an empirical morphospace for the animal kingdom\, the results 
 of which demonstrate that while many clades exhibit maximal initial dispar
 ity\, arthropods\, chordates\, annelids and mollusks have continued to exp
 lore and expand the limits of morphospace throughout the Phanerozoic\, dou
 bling the envelope of disparity occupied during the early phase of animal 
 evolution. The morphological distances between phyla mirror differences in
  complexity\, body size\, and species-level diversity across the animal ki
 ngdom. A parallel analysis of the plant kingdom exhibits a pattern of incr
 easing variance throughout evolutionary history. In testing hypotheses of 
 causality\, we find a strong correlation between increasing morphological 
 disparity and genome size as well as disparities in microRNA repertoire\, 
 our proxy for gene regulation indicating potential mechanisms underpinning
  the emergence of multicellular organismal complexity in both the animal a
 nd plant kingdoms.
LOCATION:Harker 1 seminar room\, Department of Earth Sciences
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