Data from: Phylogenomics and biogeography of North American Trechine cave beetles (Coleoptera: Carabidae)

Cave trechines beetles (Coleoptera: Carabidae: Trechini) are members of
cave communities globally and important models for understanding the
colonization of caves, adaptation to cave life, and the diversification of
cave-adapted lineages. In eastern North America, cave trechines are the
most species-rich group of terrestrial troglobionts, hypothesized to
comprise over 150 taxa in six genera with no extant surface members.
Previous studies have hypothesized that the Pleistocene climate change was
a major driver of cave colonization and diversification in the temperate
terrestrial cave fauna in this region. However, our time-calibrated
molecular phylogeny resulting from the analysis of 16,794 bases from 68
Ultraconserved Elements (UCEs) loci for 45 species of the clade supports
an alternative hypothesis whereby cave colonization of the surface
ancestor of eastern North American cave trechines likely began in the
early Miocene in the Appalachians Ridge and Valley (APP) and dispersed
into the Interior Low Plateau (ILP) in an east to west manner beginning
17.0 Mya. The APP served as a cradle for diversification and as a bridge
linking the southern Appalachians and Interior Low Plateau enabling the
dispersal and subsequent diversification of this cave beetles. Major
clades in our time-calibrated phylogeny attained their present-day
geographic distributions by the early Miocene followed by multiple
additional episodes of cave colonization and diversification occurring
throughout the Pliocene and Pleistocene. The genera Neaphanops,
Darlingtonea, Nelsonites, and Ameroduvalius were nested within speciose
genus Pseudanophthalmus supporting the hypothesis that these taxa are
derived Pseudanophthalmus. Moreover, while several morphologically-defined
species groups of Pseudanophthalmus were recovered as monophyletic, others
were not warranting future taxonomic and systematic research. The
molecular systematics and biogeography of these unique trechine cave
beetles offer a model for other comparative evolutionary and ecological
studies of troglobionts to further our understanding of factors driving
speciation and biogeographic patterns.