The Impact of the Geologic History and Paleoclimate on the Diversification of East African Cichlids

Table 1

Characteristics of the three great East African Lakes and their cichlid lineages.

	Lake	Lake	Lake Victoria
	Tanganyika	Malawi
Maximum water depth (m) [54]	1470	700	79
Average water depth (m) [54]	580	264	40
Anoxic hypolimnion [54]	50–240	250	None
Surface area (km^2) [54]	32,600	29,500	68,800
Approximate formation of lake [7, 9, 10, 55–57]	9–12 Ma	>8.6 Ma	>0.4–1.6 Ma
Approximate number of species [58]	~250	~700	~700
Number of cichlids tribes [28, 59, 60]	12–16	2	2

References in the first column refer to the table’s sources.