Département Etude des Ecosystèmes Profonds (DEEP), IFREMER, Institut Français de Recherche pour l'Exploitation de la Mer, Centre de Brest, BP70, 29280 Plouzané, France.
Syst Biol. 2012 Jan;61(1):127-37. doi: 10.1093/sysbio/syr088. Epub 2011 Aug 18.
Defining biogeographic provinces to understand the history and evolution of communities associated with a given kind of ecosystem is challenging and usually requires a priori assumptions to be made. We applied network theory, a holistic and exploratory method, to the most complete database of faunal distribution available on oceanic hydrothermal vents, environments which support fragmented and unstable ecosystems, to infer the processes driving their worldwide biogeography. Besides the identification of robust provinces, the network topology allowed us to identify preferential pathways that had hitherto been overlooked. These pathways are consistent with the previously proposed hypothesis of a role of plate tectonics in the biogeographical history of hydrothermal vent communities. A possible ancestral position of the Western Pacific is also suggested for the first time. Finally, this work provides an innovative example of the potential of network tools to unravel the biogeographic history of faunal assemblages and to supply comprehensive information for the conservation and management of biodiversity.
定义生物地理省份，以了解与给定生态系统相关的群落的历史和演化是具有挑战性的，通常需要进行先验假设。我们应用网络理论这一整体和探索性方法，对海洋热液喷口这一存在碎片化和不稳定生态系统的最完整的动物分布数据库进行了分析，以推断驱动其全球生物地理学的过程。除了确定稳健的省份外，网络拓扑结构还使我们能够识别迄今为止被忽视的优先途径。这些途径与先前提出的板块构造在热液喷口群落生物地理学历史中的作用假设一致。西太平洋可能也是一个原始的祖先位置。最后，这项工作为网络工具在揭示动物群生物地理学历史和为生物多样性的保护和管理提供全面信息方面的潜力提供了一个创新的范例。
