Macroevolutionary consequences of twin neck innovations in deep-sea dragonfishes

Abstract

The origin of novel phenotypes can influence access to new ecological resources, which may have positive, neutral, or negative effects on subsequent phenotypic diversification. In this study, we tested the macroevolutionary consequences of a pair of putative functional innovations occurring in deep-sea fishes of the order Stomiiformes. Integrating phylogenetic comparative methods, micro-CT scans, and external body measurements, we recover a mosaic of diversification trends associated with these innovations. We found some evidence for elevated evolutionary rates in tooth morphology associated with the predatory dragonfishes, which possess a gap between their vertebral column and skull that exposes the notochord and enables neck-like flexibility. However, a second novelty building upon the first, a functional neck joint enabling extreme cranial kinesis, was linked to faster rates of skull evolution. Our results suggest that innovations that help shift ecological roles and overcome functional constraints related to those roles, like gape-limitation in prey depauperate habitats, may play an important role in promoting phenotypic diversification. This work builds on a growing body of evidence highlighting how the deep sea promotes phenotypic diversity, generating the extreme forms that are celebrated by scientists and the public alike.