From Cretaceous to community: Understanding the assembly and diversity of a regional biota

Biodiversity and Biocomplexity (Economo) Unit would like to invite you to a seminar by Dr. Paul Oliver.
 
 
Date: Thursday, August 4th, 2016
Time: 11:00-12:00
Venue: Seminar Room C700, Lab 3
 
 
Speaker: Dr. Paul Oliver, Research School of Biology, Australian National University
 
Title: From Cretaceous to community: Understanding the assembly and diversity of a regional biota
 
Abstract:
Two major landmasses lie to the east of The Wallace Line (the most famous region of biotic interchange in the world): Australia is flat, dry, geologically stable and dominated by deserts, while New Guinea is mountainous, wet, geologically dynamic and cloaked in rainforest. The numerous lineages that have diversified against the varied climatic and geological background of these isolated landmasses provides an outstanding, and underexplored, opportunity to examine the relative roles that key factors such as environmental change, history, immigration and adaptation may play in shaping patterns of species accumulation within a diverse continental setting (‘a common evolutionary garden’). I will talk about my recent work developing phylogenetic and systematic frameworks for the exceptionally diverse Australasian lizard fauna in order to address these broader questions.
 
 
 
We hope to see many of you at the seminar.
Sincerely,
Chisa Oshiro
Biodiversity and Biocomplexity (Economo) Unit