Honors 221 B: DNA & Evolution

Paper 3: Cat Evolution and Migration

2/11/14





Benjamin Janicki
benjaj2
1031779







The cat family is large, diverse, and covers nearly every continent. However, cat species that share the
same continent are not necessarily closely related. For example, jaguars are found in South America, but appear
more closely related to lions in Africa than to cougars and ocelots in the Americas. How could two close relatives
end up so far apart from each other, while coexisting with more distant relatives? More specifically, what is the
history of cat evolution and migration? In the research paper The Late Miocene Radiation of Modern Felidae: A
Genetic Assessment, Warren Johnson and colleagues attempt to shed light on this mysterious question.
These researchers examined DNA from both the fossil record and modern cat species to determine which
species were most closely related to each other. For example: if they assumed that jaguars and lions were each
others closest living relatives, and they displayed less DNA differences between each other than with other cat
species, then their hypothesis would be correct. If, on the other hand, there were other cat species that had less
genetic differences with one or both of these species, then the hypothesis would be incorrect. By iterating such
hypotheses, and grouping species with the least number of differences in their DNA sequences as close relatives, the
researchers were able to reconstruct a cat family tree.
The researchers hypothesized that cat species migrated back and forth between continents during times of
low sea level when land bridges were present. Once the sea levels rose again and the land bridges disappeared, the
subsequent isolation resulted in species diversification. If this hypothesis were true, then the researchers should find
splits in the various cat lineages near times of low sea level when land bridges were more likely to have existed. If
the hypothesis were incorrect, then these splits in lineage would occur at random times in history.
Additionally, the researchers hypothesized that multiple migration events must have occurred in varying
directions in order to account for the unusual and distinct modern distribution of cat species. In other words, cats
migrated to a new continent during low sea levels, evolved differences from their relatives during the isolation of
high sea levels, and migrated back during a new period of low sea levels much later. If this hypothesis were correct,
then they should find some cat species that are more closely related to cats on different continents than their own. If
the hypothesis is incorrect, then cats should be most closely related to other species on their own continent.
Most cat species share similar skull types, which make the identification of cat fossils more difficult than in
other mammals. Before this research was conducted, there was very little scientific consensus about the
classification of cat species due to this incomplete and largely uninformative fossil record. Now, due to the results
of this new data, the researchers were able to split the cat family into eight distinct lineages, as shown in figures 1
and 2 in the appendix. These lineages include the large cats (lions, tigers, jaguars and leopards), the puma lineage
(cougars and cheetahs), the lynx lineage (lynxes and bobcats), the lineage including domestic cats and wildcats, the
lineage including ocelots and other South American cats, and three other lineages of lesser-known cat species. As
shown in figure 2, the researchers also found that many of these splits in lineage occurred near times of low sea
levels when land bridges were likely present. This data was consistent with the hypothesis that many lineages split
due to species migrating to new continents and living in isolation from their relatives.
According to the reconstructed family tree, the researchers postulated that modern cats evolved in Asia,
with the large cats being the first lineage to split off, followed by two other lineages. About 8.5 million years ago,
the ancestors of all other modern cat lineages crossed the Bering Sea land bridge from Asia into North America, and
were subsequently isolated by rising sea levels. These isolated cats split into four lineages; two of which became the
lynx and puma lineages, a third that continued to South America and became the ocelot lineage, and a forth that
returned to Asia after sea levels fell again to eventually spawn modern domestic cats and their relatives. Several
long periods without land bridges allowed these various lineages to diversify into many of the species we see today.
Much later, in the last two million years, there were several additional migrations, such as lynxes migrating
to Asia and Europe. Cheetahs appear to have evolved initially on the great plains of North America from the puma
lineage, and then migrated across the land bridge through Asia to eventually arrive in Africa. Meanwhile, lion
ancestors from Africa took the opposite route to eventually become jaguars in South America.
One question that remains is why cats such as cheetahs and lions managed to cross entire continents
without leaving any living descendants behind them. If cheetahs felt compelled to move into Asia, what changed to
make the environment there inhospitable to them? One potential hypothesis is that the environmental changes that
caused the land bridges to form also caused changes in the environments of particular continents that were favorable
to different species of cats. If this hypothesis is true, then plant fossils found in Asia from these time periods should
be more similar to plants that live in Africa today than plants that live in Asia today. If this hypothesis is incorrect,
then plant fossils from these time periods would not be more similar to modern African plants than Asian ones.



Figure 1: This is the cat family tree that resulted from the work of the researchers. The researchers divided the cat
family into eight major lineages. Approximate dates of major lineage splits are shown at the location of the splits on
the tree, and each branch and species is color coded to correspond to a geographic region.



Figure 2: This figure shows a more simplified family tree referring to specific migration events. Again, the cat
family is split into eight lineages, and branches and species are color-coded based on geographic region. On the far
left of the figure, sea level is plotted over the same time scale as the family tree, so migration events can be justified
based on possible land-bridge routes available.



Sources:

Warren E. Johnson, et al, 2006. The Late Miocene Radiation of Modern Felidae: A Genetic Assessment. Science
Vol. 311 no. 5757 pp. 73-77

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/311/5757/73.full