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Data from: Origin of the Laurentian Great Lakes fish fauna through upward adaptive radiation cascade prior to the Last Glacial Maximum

Backenstose, Nathan1; MacGuigan, Daniel1; Osborne, Christopher1; Bernal, Moises2; Thomas, Elizabeth1; Normandeau, Eric3; Yule, Daniel4; Stott, Wendylee5; Ackiss, Amanda4; Albert, Victor1; Bernatchez, Louis3; Krabbenhoft, Trevor1

Research facility: University at Buffalo, State University of New York
Published Aug 19, 2024 on Dryad. https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.n02v6wx59

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Abstract

The evolutionary histories of adaptive radiations can be marked by dramatic demographic fluctuations. However, the demographic histories of ecologically-linked co-diversifying lineages remain understudied. The Laurentian Great Lakes provide a unique system of two such radiations that are dispersed across depth gradients with a predator-prey relationship. We show that the North American Coregonus species complex (“ciscoes”) radiated rapidly prior to the Last Glacial Maximum (80-90 kya), a globally warm period, followed by rapid expansion in population size. Similar patterns of demographic expansion were observed in the predator species, Lake Charr (ˆ), following a brief time lag, which we hypothesize was driven by predator-prey dynamics. Diversification of prey into deepwater created ecological opportunities for the predators, facilitating their demographic expansion, which is consistent with an upward adaptive radiation cascade. This study provides a new timeline and environmental context for the origin of the Laurentian Great Lakes fish fauna and firmly establishes this system as a driver of ecological diversification and rapid speciation through cyclical glaciation.