The factors affecting evolutionary diversification

The number of species on the Earth is estimated to lie between five to ten millions. All these species originated from a common ancestor, which appeared on our planet 3,5 bilion years ago. Speciation and extinction are responsible for the current species richness. Evolutionary diversification is the difference between speciation and extinction. There are several methods used to obtain the values of speciation, extinction and diversification rates. I will briefly explain some of these methods, outline the advantages and disadvantages of them. The aim of this paper is to summarize current knowledge of evolutionary diversification and factors that may affect it. In this search I focused on the studies dealing with factors that may affect several groups of organisms. Although many determinants of diversification were found, most of them affect only one group of organisms. Here I did not find any factor that would be common for the majority of taxa. Evolutionary diversification is probably influenced by different factors in different evolutionary lineages. Key words: diversification, speciation, radiation, diversity gradien