Map of the World's Vertebrates Updates 19th Century Classic (1 of 7) (IMAGE)

American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)

Map of the World's Vertebrates Updates 19th Century Classic (1 of 7)

Caption

This is a modern map of the vertebrate world. Researchers have combined information on the distribution and evolutionary relationships of over 20,000 species of amphibians, birds and mammals to identify 11 major global realms. The colors of the realms reflect the uniqueness of the animals found within then. Realms with similar colors contain very similar species and those with different colors contain very different species. This image relates to a paper that appeared in the Dec. 20, 2012, issue of Science Express, published by AAAS. The paper, by Ben Holt at University of Copenhagen in Copenhagen, Denmark, and colleagues was titled, "An Update of Wallace's Zoogeographic Regions of the World."

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Image courtesy of <i>Science<i>/AAAS

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