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Morphological support for a close relationship between hippos and whales

2003; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 23; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1671/32

1937-2809

Jonathan H. Geisler, Mark D. Uhen,

Ecology and biodiversity studies

Recent discoveries of the ankles of fossil whales, reported by Gingerich et al. (2001) and Thewissen et al. (2001b), corroborated the molecular hypothesis that Cetacea (whales, dolphins, and porpoises) are closely related to artiodactyls (evenhoofed mammals including hippopotami, pigs, deer, and camels); however, major points of disagreement remain. A morphology-based study incorporating some of these new data (Thewissen et al., 2001b) supported the exclusion of Cetacea from the clade of living artiodactyls. In contrast, a vast amount of molecular data support placement of Cetacea within Artiodactyla, as close relatives to Hippopotamidae (Gatesy et al., 1996, 1999; Montgelard et al., 1997; Shimamura et al., 1997, 1999; Nikaido et al., 2001). Here we report that morphological data from extinct and extant taxa support placement of Cetacea within Artiodactyla as the closest relatives of Hippopotamidae (Fig. 1B) and indicate that molecular and morphological evidence for the phylogeny of these taxa are now much more congruent than previously thought.