DOI: 10.5061/dryad.b6225
title: Data from: Continental diversification of an African catfish radiation (Mochokidae: Synodontis)

description: Despite African rivers containing high species diversity,
 continental-scale studies investigating the mechanisms generating
 biological diversity of African riverine faunas are limited compared to
 lacustrine systems.To investigate the build up of diversity in a tropical
 aquatic continental radiation, we test different models of lineage
 diversification and reconstruct the biogeographic history in a
 species-rich siluriform genus, Synodontis (~130 species), with a broad
 distribution across all major tropical African drainage basins. The
 resulting robust species-level phylogeny (~60% complete, based on a
 multigene dataset) exhibits a near constant rate of lineage accumulation
 throughout the mid-Cenozoic to Recent, irrespective of missing species and
 despite the changing environmental conditions that were prevalent during
 this time period. This pattern contrasts with the findings for
 species-level diversification of large clades that commonly show an early
 burst of cladogenesis followed by declining rates through time. The
 identification of distinct biogeographic cladesdemonstrates acorrelation
 between river hydrology and cladogenesis, although there is evidence of
 recent repeat dispersal into the southern range of the focal group.We
 conclude that diverse freshwater fish radiations with tropical continental
 distributions represent important organisms to test hypotheses of
 diversification and investigate the effects of palaeo landscapes and
 climates on present day biodiversity.
description: Dayetal_Synodontis_matrixTable S1Provenance, voucher, field and Genbank accession data for samples used in phylogenetic analyses.Table_S1_revised.docTable S2Geographic range data for biogeographical analyses.Table_S2.docTable S3Testing for rate variation in the original dataset including missing species and biogeographic clades using the maximum likelihood ΔAIC test statistic.Table_S3_revised.docFigure S1Individual gene trees of Synodontis relationships inferred from Bayesian analyses for a) mitochondrial Cytochrome oxidase I (COI), b) mitochondrial Cytochrome b (Cyt b + tRNA-pro), c) nuclear S7 ribosomal protein intron 1 and 2 (S7) and d) nuclear recombination activating gene (Rag 2). Taxa are colour coded according to the biogeographical clade they nest within based on Figure 2: purple, Congo Basin; blue, East Africa; green, West Africa (light green WA NS; dark green WA LGF). BPP values include black circle: &gt;85%; black square 70-84%.Figure_S1ab.pdfFigure S1 cont.Individual gene trees of Synodontis relationships inferred from Bayesian analyses for a) mitochondrial Cytochrome oxidase I (COI), b) mitochondrial Cytochrome b (Cyt b + tRNA-pro), c) nuclear S7 ribosomal protein intron 1 and 2 (S7) and d) nuclear recombination activating gene (Rag 2). Taxa are colour coded according to the biogeographical clade they nest within based on Figure 2: purple, Congo Basin; blue, East Africa; green, West Africa (light green WA NS; dark green WA LGF). BPP values include black circle: &gt;85%; black square 70-84%.Figure_S1cd.pdf