Macroecological and biogeographical patterns of limb reduction in the world's skinks

Aim: Limb reduction is a dramatic evolutionary transition, yet whether it is achieved in similar trajectories across clades, and its environmental drivers, remain unclear. We investigate the macroevolutionary and biogeographical patterns of limb reduction in skinks, where limb reduction occurred more often than in any other tetrapod clade, and test their associations with substrate categories using a global database. We test for habitat associations of body shapes in a group of Australian skinks using quantitative habitat data.