Zoogeography is the branch of the science of

biogeography Biogeography is the study of the distribution of species and ecosystems in geographic space and through geological time. Organisms and biological communities often vary in a regular fashion along geographic gradients of latitude, elevation, ...

that is concerned with geographic distribution (present and past) of

animal Animals are multicellular, eukaryotic organisms in the biological kingdom Animalia. With few exceptions, animals consume organic material, breathe oxygen, are able to move, can reproduce sexually, and go through an ontogenetic stage ...

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriat ...

. As a multifaceted field of study, zoogeography incorporates methods of molecular biology, genetics, morphology,

phylogenetics In biology, phylogenetics (; from Greek φυλή/ φῦλον [] "tribe, clan, race", and wikt:γενετικός, γενετικός [] "origin, source, birth") is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups ...

, and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to delineate evolutionary events within defined regions of study around the globe. Once proposed by

Alfred Russel Wallace Alfred Russel Wallace (8 January 1823 – 7 November 1913) was a British natural history, naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist, biologist and illustrator. He is best known for independently conceiving the theory of evolution thro ...

, known to be the father of zoogeography, phylogenetic affinities can be quantified among zoogeographic regions, further elucidating the phenomena surrounding geographic distributions of organisms and explaining evolutionary relationships of taxa. Advancements in molecular biology and theory of evolution within zoological research has unraveled questions concerning speciation events and has expanded phylogenic relationships amongst taxa. Integration of phylogenetics with GIS provides a means for communicating evolutionary origins through cartographic design. Related research linking phylogenetics and GIS has been conducted in areas of the southern Atlantic, Mediterranean, and Pacific Oceans. Recent innovations in DNA bar-coding, for example, have allowed for explanations of phylogenetic relationships within two families of marine venomous fishes,

scorpaenidae The Scorpaenidae (also known as scorpionfish) are a family of mostly marine fish that includes many of the world's most venomous species. As their name suggests, scorpionfish have a type of "sting" in the form of sharp spines coated with venom ...

and

tetraodontidae Tetraodontidae is a family of primarily marine and estuarine fish of the order Tetraodontiformes. The family includes many familiar species variously called pufferfish, puffers, balloonfish, blowfish, blowies, bubblefish, globefish, swellfis ...

, residing in the Andaman Sea. Continued efforts to understand species evolutionary divergence articulated in the geologic time scale based on fossil records for killifish (''Aphanius'' and ''Aphanolebias'') in locales of the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on ...

and

Paratethys The Paratethys sea, Paratethys ocean, Paratethys realm or just Paratethys was a large shallow inland sea that stretched from the region north of the Alps over Central Europe to the Aral Sea in Central Asia. Paratethys was peculiar due to its p ...

areas revealed climatological influences during the

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and means "less recen ...

Further development of research within zoogeography has expanded upon knowledge of the productivity of South Atlantic ocean regions and distribution of organisms in analogous regions, providing both ecological and geographic data to supply a framework for the taxonomic relationships and evolutionary branching of benthic polychaetes. Modern-day zoogeography also places a reliance on GIS to integrate a more precise understanding and predictive model of the past, current, and future population dynamics of animal species both on land and in the ocean. Through employment of GIS technology, linkages between abiotic factors of habitat such as topography, latitude, longitude, temperatures, and sea level can serve to explain the distribution of species populations through geologic time. Understanding correlations of habitat formation and the migration patterns of organisms at an ecological level allows for explanations of speciation events that may have arisen due to physical geographic isolation events or the incorporation of new refugia to survive unfavorable environmental conditions

Zoogeographic regions

Schmarda Ludwig Karl Schmarda (23 August 1819 – 7 April 1908) was an Austrian naturalist and traveler, born at Olmütz, Moravia. Early life and education Schmarda was born at Olmütz where he attended the Grammar School and the Philosophical Cours ...

(1853) proposed 21 regions, while Woodward proposed 27 terrestrial and 18 marine, Murray (1866) proposed 4, Blyth (1871) proposed 7, Allen (1871) 8 regions, Heilprin (1871) proposed 6, Newton (1893) proposed 6, Gadow (1893) proposed 4.

Philip Sclater Philip Lutley Sclater (4 November 1829 – 27 June 1913) was an England, English lawyer and zoologist. In zoology, he was an expert ornithologist, and identified the main zoogeographic regions of the world. He was Secretary of the Zoological ...

(1858) and

Alfred Wallace Alfred Russel Wallace (8 January 1823 – 7 November 1913) was a British naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist, biologist and illustrator. He is best known for independently conceiving the theory of evolution through natural se ...

(1876) identified the main zoogeographic regions of the world used today:

Palaearctic The Palearctic or Palaearctic is the largest of the eight biogeographic realms of the Earth. It stretches across all of Eurasia north of the foothills of the Himalayas, and North Africa. The realm consists of several bioregions: the Euro-Sibe ...

, Aethiopian (today Afrotropic),

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area, the List of countries and dependencies by population, second-most populous ...

(today

Indomalaya The Indomalayan realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms. It extends across most of South and Southeast Asia and into the southern parts of East Asia. Also called the Oriental realm by biogeographers, Indomalaya spreads all over the Indi ...

n), Australasian,

Nearctic The Nearctic realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms constituting the Earth's land surface. The Nearctic realm covers most of North America, including Greenland, Central Florida, and the highlands of Mexico. The parts of North America ...

and

Neotropical The Neotropical realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms constituting Earth's land surface. Physically, it includes the tropical terrestrial ecoregions of the Americas and the entire South American temperate zone. Definition In bioge ...

. Marine regionalization began with Ortmann (1896). In a similar way to geobotanic divisions, our planet is divided in zoogeographical (or faunal) regions (further divided as provinces, territories and districts), sometimes including the categories Empire and Domain. The current trend is to classify the floristic kingdoms of botany or zoogeographic regions of zoology as

biogeographic realm A biogeographic realm or ecozone is the broadest biogeographic division of Earth's land surface, based on distributional patterns of terrestrial organisms. They are subdivided into bioregions, which are further subdivided into ecoregions. ...

s. Following, some examples of regionalizations:

Sclater (1858)

Creatio Palaeogeana * I. Regio Palaearctica * II. Regio Aethiopica * III. Regio Indica * IV. Regio Australiana Creatio Neogeana * V. Regio Nearctica * VI. Regio Neotropica

Huxley (1868)

Huxley (1868) scheme: * Arctogea ** Nearctic province ** Palaearctic province ** Ethiopian province ** Indian province * Notogea ** Austro-Columbia province (= Neotropical) ** Australasia province (= Australian; Eastern Palaeotropical)

Wallace (1876)

* Palaearctic region * Ethiopian region * Oriental region * Australian region * Neotropical region * Nearctic region

Trouessart (1890)

Scheme by Trouessart (1890):Trouessart, E. L. (1890). ''La géographie zoologique''. Bailliere, Paris

* Arctic region * Antarctic region * Palearctic region * Nearctic region * Ethiopian region * Oriental region * Neotropical region * Australian region

Darlington (1957)

First scheme: * Realm Megagea (Arctogea): the main part of the world ** 1. Ethiopian Region: Africa (except the northern corner), with part of southern Arabia ** 2. Oriental Region: tropical Asia, with associated continental islands ** 3. Palearctic Region: Eurasia above the tropics, with the northern corner of Africa ** 4. Nearctic Region: North America, excepting the tropical part of Mexico * Realm Neogea ** 5. Neotropical Region: South and Central America with the tropical part of Mexico * Realm Notogea ** 6. Australian Region: Australia, with New Guinea, etc. Second scheme: * Climate-limited regions ** 1. Palearctic Region ** 2. Nearctic Region * Main regions of the Old World tropics ** 3. Oriental Region ** 4. Ethiopian Region * Barrier-limited regions ** 5. Neotropical Region ** 6. Australian Region

References

Bibliography

* Bodenheimer, F.S. (1935). ''Animal life in Palestine. An introduction to the problems of animal ecology and zoogeography''. L. Mayer: Jerusalem. 506 p.

* Ekman, Sven (1953). ''Zoogeography of the sea''. London, Sidgwick and Jackson. 417 p.

External links

* * * * {{Authority control Biogeography