University of Tasmania
Browse
Halliwell et al_NatComms_2017.pdf (1.15 MB)

Live bearing promotes the evolution of sociality in reptiles

Download (1.15 MB)
journal contribution
posted on 2023-05-19, 14:09 authored by Benjamin HalliwellBenjamin Halliwell, Uller, T, Barbara HollandBarbara Holland, Geoffrey WhileGeoffrey While
Identifying factors responsible for the emergence and evolution of social complexity is an outstanding challenge in evolutionary biology. Here we report results from a phylogenetic comparative analysis of over 1000 species of squamate reptile, nearly 100 of which exhibit facultative forms of group living, including prolonged parent–offspring associations. We show that the evolution of social groupings among adults and juveniles is overwhelmingly preceded by the evolution of live birth across multiple independent origins of both traits. Furthermore, the results suggest that live bearing has facilitated the emergence of social groups that remain stable across years, similar to forms of sociality observed in other vertebrates. These results suggest that live bearing has been a fundamentally important precursor in the evolutionary origins of group living in the squamates.

Funding

Australian Research Council

History

Publication title

Nature Communications

Volume

8

Article number

2030

Number

2030

Pagination

1-8

ISSN

2041-1723

Department/School

School of Natural Sciences

Publisher

Nature publishing group

Place of publication

United Kingdom

Rights statement

Copyright 2017 The Authors. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Repository Status

  • Open

Socio-economic Objectives

Expanding knowledge in the biological sciences

Usage metrics

    University Of Tasmania

    Exports

    RefWorks
    BibTeX
    Ref. manager
    Endnote
    DataCite
    NLM
    DC