UCLA

Marine fishes comprise one of the most colorful assemblages of living vertebrates. The diversityof color mechanisms and color patterns is an interesting metric to consider within evolutionary history, however the actual diversity has never been quantified broadly across fishes. Although previous studies have linked diversity of color and color patterns in reef fish to factors ranging from sexual selection and communication with conspecifics to predator-prey interactions, these hypotheses have not been tested in a comparative evolutionary framework. I intend to quantify diversity of color mechanisms and patterns across marine acanthomorphs, which encompass a wide range of morphological, ecological, behavioral, and trophic diversity. This research will apply phylogenetic comparative methods to reef fish color data, integrating phenotypic data with biotic and abiotic factors that contribute to observed color and pattern diversity, to adequately test multiple hypotheses within an evolutionary framework. The aim of this research is to determine how and when diversity in color and color patterns was assembled at different comparative phylogenetic scales. The relative influence of biotic and abiotic factors in determining observed levels of diversity will be quantified to determine the proportional impacts of ecology and life history on color diversity.