Rapid radiation in a highly diverse marine environment

Abstract

SignificanceAdaptive radiation, the evolutionary process whereby a lineage diversifies over a short period of time, often occurs in geographically isolated or newly formed habitats where colonizing species encounter unoccupied niches and reduced selective pressures. Rapid radiations may also occur in diverse and complex environments, but these cases are less well documented. Here, we show that the hamlets, a group of Caribbean reef fishes, radiated within the last 10,000 generations in a burst of diversification that ranks among the fastest in fishes. Genomic analysis suggests that color pattern diversity is generated by different combinations of alleles at a few genes with large effect. Such a modular genomic architecture of diversification is emerging as a common denominator to a variety of radiations.