[Taxacom] North America, Central America + S.E. Asia sister taxa

[Kipling (Kip) Will]

Johan,
Peculiar in the sense that it is atypical for ground beetle 
distributions, thus my search to see if it found in other group. 
However, I would not describe it as "South East Asia and the New World", 
since the New World is a much, much bigger area than the area where the 
beetles are found, nor does "trans-Pacific" clearly capture the pattern. 
The latter strikes me as vague since Australia-New Zealand-Chile and 
Korea-California are both "trans-Pacific", but surely due to different 
historical events, and these different from North America, Central 
America-S.E. Asia.

To be more specific the New World clade is only found east of the 
Rockies would be more likely have a Laurasian connection to the 
Thailand-Vietnam clade, I think. We have plenty of Laurasian or 
Beringial connections in ground beetles, but typically these have some 
elements also in the Paleartic, which is lacking in my beetles. Perhaps 
they had a much wider distribution once and extinction has eliminated 
the middle. However, such a scenario feels a bit too Darlingtonian for 
my me at this point.

Kip


On 12/20/2011 7:03 AM, John Grehan wrote:
> Kip,
>
> Thank you for the clarification. I guess I am puzzled about your
> referring to it as a 'peculiar' distribution, at least with respect to a
> taxon existing in South East Asia and the New World since these types
> are patterns are commonplace and are spatially diagnostic as being
> trans-Pacific.
>
> Admittedly, many such groups may lack a rigorous phylogenetic analysis,
> but on the other hand I suspect many do.
>
> John Grehan
>