Data from: Arrival and diversification of caviomorph rodents and platyrrhine primates in South America.

Platyrrhine primates and caviomorph rodents are clades of mammals that
colonized South America during its period of isolation from the other
continents, between 100 and 3 million years ago (Mya). Until now, no
molecular study investigated the timing of the South American colonization
by these two lineages with the same molecular data set. Using sequences
from three nuclear genes (ADRA2B, vWF, and IRBP, both separate and
combined) from 60 species, and eight fossil calibration constraints, we
estimated the times of origin and diversification of platyrrhines and
caviomorphs via a Bayesian relaxed molecular clock approach. To account
for the possible effect of an accelerated rate of evolution of the IRBP
gene along the branch leading to the anthropoids, we performed the datings
with and without IRBP (3768 sites and 2469 sites, respectively). The time
window for the colonization of South America by primates and by rodents is
demarcated by the dates of origin (upper bound) and radiation (lower
bound) of platyrrhines and caviomorphs. According to this approach,
platyrrhine primates colonized South America between 37.0 +/- 3.0 Mya (or
38.9 +/- 4.0 Mya without IRBP) and 16.8 +/- 2.3 (or 20.1 +/- 3.3) Mya, and
caviomorph rodents between 45.4 +/- 4.1 (or 43.7 +/- 4.8) Mya and 36.7 +/-
3.7 (or 35.8 +/- 4.3) Mya. Considering both the fossil record and these
molecular datings, the favored scenarios are a trans-Atlantic migration of
primates from Africa at the end of the Eocene or beginning of the
Oligocene, and a colonization of South America by rodents during the
Middle or Late Eocene. Based on our nuclear DNA data, we cannot rule out
the possibility of a concomitant arrival of primates and rodents in South
America. The caviomorphs radiated soon after their arrival, before the
Oligocene glaciations, and these early caviomorph lineages persisted until
the present. By contrast, few platyrrhine fossils are known in the
Oligocene, and the present-day taxa are the result of a quite recent,
Early Miocene diversification.