Abstract
BackgroundBrazilian populations of Lutzomyia longipalpis may constitute a complex of cryptic species, and this report investigates the distribution and number of potential sibling species. One of the main differences observed among Brazilian populations is the type of acoustic signal produced by males during copulation. These copulation song differences seem to be evolving faster than neutral molecular markers and have been suggested to contribute to insemination failure observed in crosses between these sibling species. In previous studies, two main types of copulation songs were found, burst-type and pulse-type. The latter type can, in turn, be further subdivided into five different patterns.MethodsWe recorded male song from 13 new populations of the L. longipalpis complex from Brazil and compared the songs with 12 already available.ResultsOut of these 25 populations, 16 produce burst-type and 9 produce pulse-type songs. We performed a principal component analysis in these two main groups separately and an additional discriminant analysis in the pulse-type group. The pulse-type populations showed a clear separation between the five known patterns with a high correspondence of individuals to their correct group, confirming the differentiation between them. The distinctiveness of the burst-type subgroups was much lower than that observed among the pulse-type groups and no clear population structure was observed. This suggests that the burst-type populations represent a single species.ConclusionOverall, our results are consistent with the existence in Brazil of at least six species of the L. longipalpis complex, one with a wide distribution comprising all the populations with burst-type songs, and five more closely related allopatric siblings with different pulse-type song patterns and more restricted distribution ranges.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13071-015-0900-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
Brazilian populations of Lutzomyia longipalpis may constitute a complex of cryptic species, and this report investigates the distribution and number of potential sibling species
The different song patterns observed in Brazilian populations suggests that song is evolving faster than other phenotypic traits, probably because it is under sexual selection [2, 3, 5, 34]
Acoustic communication has often been implicated in sexual selection [6] and this is likely that it has this role in the L. longipalpis species complex since the songs are produced during copulation and some studies suggest the existence of a mechanism of recognition
Summary
Brazilian populations of Lutzomyia longipalpis may constitute a complex of cryptic species, and this report investigates the distribution and number of potential sibling species. Acoustic communication has been implicated in sexual selection and can act as a recognition signal in Lutzomyia longipalpis (Diptera: Psychodidae) males produce a song to females during copulation that may contribute to reproductive success [9,10,11]. This sand fly is the main vector of American visceral leishmaniasis and it constitutes a species complex [12,13,14]. Among the evidences for the existence of cryptic species in Brazil is Vigoder et al Parasites & Vectors (2015) 8:290
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