It appears you don't have support to open PDFs in this web browser. To view this file, Open with your PDF reader
Abstract
Many models to explain the differences in the flora and fauna of tropical and temperate regions assume that whole clades are restricted to the tropics. We develop methods to assess the extent to which biotas are geographically discrete, and find that transition zones between regions occupied by tropical-associated or temperate-associated biotas are often narrow, suggesting a role for freezing temperatures in partitioning global biotas. Across the steepest tropical-temperate gradient in the world, that of the Himalaya, bird communities below and above the freezing line are largely populated by different tropical and temperate biotas with links to India and Southeast Asia, or to China respectively. The importance of the freezing line is retained when clades rather than species are considered, reflecting confinement of different clades to one or another climate zone. The reality of the sharp tropical-temperate boundary adds credence to the argument that exceptional species richness in the tropics reflects species accumulation over time, with limited transgressions of species and clades into the temperate.
You have requested "on-the-fly" machine translation of selected content from our databases. This functionality is provided solely for your convenience and is in no way intended to replace human translation. Show full disclaimer
Neither ProQuest nor its licensors make any representations or warranties with respect to the translations. The translations are automatically generated "AS IS" and "AS AVAILABLE" and are not retained in our systems. PROQUEST AND ITS LICENSORS SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIM ANY AND ALL EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION, ANY WARRANTIES FOR AVAILABILITY, ACCURACY, TIMELINESS, COMPLETENESS, NON-INFRINGMENT, MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. Your use of the translations is subject to all use restrictions contained in your Electronic Products License Agreement and by using the translation functionality you agree to forgo any and all claims against ProQuest or its licensors for your use of the translation functionality and any output derived there from. Hide full disclaimer
Details



1 Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA; Data Science Lab, Office of the Chief Information Officer, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA; National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA
2 Department of Statistics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA; Department of Epidemiology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
3 Wildlife Institute of India, Chandrabani, Dehradun, India
4 Department of Statistics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA; Department of Human Genetics, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
5 Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA