The Midas Cichlid In Nicaragua

The Midas cichlid species complex: incipient sympatric speciation in Nicaraguan cichlid fishes?

Abstract Sympatric speciation is a contentious concept, although theoretical models as well as empirical evidence support its relevance in evolutionary biology. The Midas cichlid species complex (Amphilophus citrinellus, labiatus, zaliosus) from several crater lakes in Nicaragua fits several of the key characteristics of a sympatric speciation model. In particular, in A. citrinellus (i) strong ...

Competition Between Color Morphs of the Midas Cichlid, Cichlasoma citrinellum, in Lake Jiloá, Nicaragua

Competition between Color Morphs of the Polychromatic Midas Cichlid Cichlasoma citrinellum.

The Midas cichlid, Cichlasoma citrinellum, is a polychromatic fish that occurs in Nicaragua. All of these fish start life as normally colored, cryptic individuals. In some populations a few fish change into conspicuously colored morphs, most frequently gold. When kept in unmixed color groups, golds and normals grow at the same rate; but when they are mixed, growth of the golds becomes faster an...

Phylogenetic Relationships and Evolutionary Ecology of Nicaraguan Midas-cichlids (amphilophus Spp.)

Nicaraguan Midas cichlids from crater lakes have recently attracted attention as potential model systems for speciation research, but no attempt has been made to comprehensively reconstruct phylogenetic relationships of this highly diverse and recently evolved species complex. We present a first AFLP (2793 loci) and mtDNA based phylogenetic hypothesis including all described and several undescr...

The Role of microRNAs in the Repeated Parallel Diversification of Lineages of Midas Cichlid Fish from Nicaragua

Cichlid fishes are an ideal model system for studying biological diversification because they provide textbook examples of rapid speciation. To date, there has been little focus on the role of gene regulation during cichlid speciation. However, in recent years, gene regulation has been recognized as a powerful force linking diversification in gene function to speciation. Here, we investigated t...