Ant-like Research Articles

Parasitic cockroaches indicate complex states of earliest proved ants

Myrmecophilous and termitophilous interactions likely contributed to the competitive advantage and evolutionary success of eusocial insects, but how these commensal and parasitic relationships originated is unclear due to absence of fossil records. New extinct cockroaches of the still living family Blattidae are reported here from the Cretaceous Myanmar amber (99 Ma) and are the earliest known inhabitants of complex ant nests, demonstrating that this specialised myrmecophily originated shortly after ant eusociality and appeared in the fossil record. Cretaceous stem aposematic Blattidae are known from the amber of Myanmar and Lebanon and we report them here also from the Syrian amber. Concurrent evolution suggests that the collective internal defence of early ants was weak and allowed infiltrations by numerous unrelated organisms, At the same time, the contemporary presence of ant mimicking myrmecomorphs suggests a need for strong external protection against visually hunting predators. Myrmecophily is supported by morphological adaptations (lack of wide fat body and feeding of adult male; short, fossorial legs; shortened cerci; oligomerised antenna; hairy surface structures) and camouflage behaviour, documented by sediment and own feces covering. Moreover the same piece of amber contains ants, ant mimics and other undescribed ant nest-visiting insects as syninclusions. Another species preserved along with two termites is a putative termitophile. Abundant comparatively large parasitic cockroaches influenced Mesozoic tropical forest ecosystems by affecting the early evolution of complex nests of eusocial insects. Rainforest rudiments in South Yunnan yielded observation of analogical still living, formally undescribed species.

Batesian insect-insect mimicry-related explosive radiation of ancient alienopterid cockroaches

Batesian mimicry is a relationship in which a harmful organism (the model) is mimicked by a harmless organism (the mimic), which gains protection because predators mistake it for the model. It is the most widely studied of mimicry complexes and has undoubtedly played an important role in the speciation of various animals especially insects. However, little is known about the early evolution of this important behavior and its evolutionary significance owing to a dearth of paleontological records. Here we report several specialized representatives of the family Alienopteridae from the Early Cretaceous of Brazil, mid-Cretaceous Burmite, and the Eocene of the USA. They exhibit unique morphological adaptations for wasp and ant mimicry and represent one of the oldest evidence of Batesian mimicry in the insect fossil record. Our findings reveal at least 65-million-year coevolution between extinct alienopterids and aculeates. Phylogenetic Bayesian network analysis houses Alienopteridae within Umenocoleidae explosively radiating ~127 Ma. Alienopteridae is the only Mesozoic-type cockroach family which passed K/Pg.

Genus Pseudolepturges Gilmour (1957) (Coleoptera: Cerambycidae: Lamiinae): a new species from Bolivia, key to the species of the genus and first reports of a possible Pseudomyrmex ant mimic in longhorn beetles

A new species of Pseudolepturges from Bolivia is described and illustrated; a key to the species is also provided. Based on the similar body size, orange-yellowish colour, behaviour, and close co-occurrence on a Triplaris americana tree, we suggest that Pseudolepturges triplarinus sp. nov. is a mimic of the ant Pseudomyrmex triplarinus.http://www.zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:6DF38C64-6986-4A79-8D9A-645DA89149F2

A review of the wasp mimicking spider genus Coenoptychus Simon, 1885 (Araneae: Corinnidae: Castianeirinae).

The monotypic velvet ant-mimicking spider genus Coenoptychus Simon, 1885 is revised. The paper provides the first detailed morphological and genitalic description, with the first description and illustrations of the male of the type species, Coenoptychus pulcher Simon, 1885, and a redescription of its female. Two new combinations are proposed: Coenoptychus mutillicus (Haddad, 2004) comb. nov. and Coenoptychus tropicalis (Haddad, 2004) comb. nov.; both species were previously included in Graptartia Simon, 1896. The distribution records of the genus are updated.

Behavioural Ecology: Spiders Play the Imitation Game

Examples of mimicry are widely celebrated because of the remarkable physical similarities they entail. A new study shows how an ant-mimicking spider uses behaviour to create the illusion of antennae, while walking in a manner resembling ants following pheromone trails.

A Species Richness Hotspot of Ant-Mimicking Sac Spiders (Araneae: Corinnidae: Castianeirinae) at the Bolivian Orocline, With New Country Records for Three Genera and Nine Species

A species richness hotspot of ant-mimicking (or myrmecomorphic) spiders of the subfamily Castianeirinae Reiskind, 1969, is reported from the premontane Chiquitano forest at the Bolivian orocline. In a transect of 350 m in a forest fragment of ~10 ha, 148 individuals of five genera and 10 species were collected, including the first country records for the genera Mazax O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1898, Myrmecotypus O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1894, and Sphecotypus O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1895. The observations from this study represent an increase of the known fauna of Bolivian Castianeirinae from two to five genera and from three to at least 12 species. The generic and species richness is comparable with the fauna of mega-diverse moist forests in other Neotropical countries and may result from overlapping distributional ranges of faunal elements from several ecoregions. The discovery of this hotspot in an easily accessible and small area provides an excellent opportunity to gain further insight into the factors determining the evolutionary ecology and ant mimicry in Castianeirinae communities.

Revision of eastern Australian ant-mimicking spiders of the genus Myrmarachne (Araneae, Salticidae) reveals a complex of species and forms

In revising eastern Australian Myrmarachne, we provide descriptions of four new species (Myrmarachne helensmithae sp. nov., Myrmarachne macaulayi sp. nov.

The role of ultraviolet colour in the assessment of mimetic accuracy between Batesian mimics and their models: a case study using ant-mimicking spiders.

The use of ultraviolet (UV) cues for intra- and inter-specific communication is common in many animal species. Still, the role of UV signals under some predator-prey contexts, such as Batesian mimicry, is not clear. Batesian mimicry is a defensive strategy by which a palatable species (the mimic) resembles an unpalatable or noxious species (the model) to avoid predation. This strategy has evolved independently in many different taxa that are predated by species capable of UV perception. Moreover, there is considerable variation in how accurately Batesian mimics resemble their models across species. Our aim was to investigate how UV colour contributed to mimetic accuracy using several ant-mimicking spider species as a case study. We measured the reflectance spectrum (300-700nm) for several species of mimics and models, and we tested whether they differ in visible and UV colour. We modelled whether two different predators could discriminate between mimics and models using colour information. We found that generally, ant-mimicking spiders differed significantly from their ant models in UV colour and that information from the visible range of light cannot be extrapolated into the UV. Our modelling suggested that wasps should be able to discriminate between mimics and models combining information from visible and the UV light, whereas birds may not discriminate between them. Thus, we show that UV colour can influence mimic accuracy and we discuss its potential role in Batesian mimicry. We conclude that colour, especially in the UV range, should be taken into account when measuring mimetic accuracy.

Swarm-Based Routing Protocol Assisted by Weakly Connected Dominating Sets for Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks

With the advancement of the mobile ad-hoc network (MANET), many researches were proposed to increase the efficiency of networks. The important factor affects the performance in MANET is discovering and maintaining paths since the node’s mobility causes topology change, which needs to be observed for effective communication. One of the popular studies for routing in the networks in recent years is the swarm intelligence which imitates the collective behavior of biological species to solve routing problems in the networks. Another efficient method is clustering scheme which can be auxiliary structure to cluster nodes in the network. In this paper, we use weakly connected dominating sets (WCDS) which clusters network by node's maximum degree or minimum ID to propose an improved ant-based on-demand clustering routing (AOCR) protocol. AOCR uses ant-like agents inspired by the foraging behavior of ant colonies to explore networks and discover a route which fulfills several Quailty of Service (QoS) requirements including minimal traffic overhead or energy-efficiency for MANET.

Similar yet different: differential response of a praying mantis to ant-mimicking spiders

Batesian mimics typically dupe visual predators by resembling noxious or deadly model species. Ants are unpalatable and dangerous to many arthropod taxa, and are popular invertebrate models in mimicry studies. Ant mimicry by spiders, especially jumping spiders, has been studied and researchers have examined whether visual predators can distinguish between the ant model, spider mimic and spider non-mimics. Tropical habitats harbour a diverse community of ants, their mimics and predators. In one such tripartite mimicry system, we investigated the response of an invertebrate visual predator, the ant-mimicking praying mantis (Euantissa pulchra), to two related ant-mimicking spider prey of the genus Myrmarachne, each closely mimicking its model ant species. We found that weaver ants (Oecophylla smaragdina) were much more aggressive than carpenter ants (Camponotus sericeus) towards the mantis. Additionally, mantids exhibited the same aversive response towards ants and their mimics. More importantly, mantids approached carpenter ant-mimicking spiders significantly more than often that they approached weaver ant-mimicking spiders. Thus, in this study, we show that an invertebrate predator, the praying mantis, can indeed discriminate between two closely related mimetic prey. The exact mechanism of the discrimination remains to be tested, but it is likely to depend on the level of mimetic accuracy by the spiders and on the aggressiveness of the ant model organism.

Locomotory mimicry in ant-like spiders

The jumping spider genus Myrmarachne (Salticidae) consists of over 200 species of morphologically accurate ant mimics, enabling Myrmarachne to evade ant-averse predators that confuse the spiders with ants (Batesian mimicry). A conspicuous but untested trait of Myrmarachne, which is frequently mentioned in the literature, is locomotory mimicry. For these spiders, locomotion that is more ant like than salticid like may be an integral part of the suite of mimetic signals. We quantified the locomotory pattern of several species of non-ant-like salticids, Myrmarachne, and ants from Australia. We found that the locomotion of the mimics generally resembles that of ants, but not of other salticids. To tease out the effects of locomotion from those based on morphology, ant-eating salticids as visual predators were presented with 3D animations of ant-like salticids walking either in ant or in salticid fashion. Ant-eating salticids spent significantly longer looking at the stimulus with ant-like movement and were significantly more likely to visually track and stalk the stimulus with ant-like movement. Overall, our results suggest that there is selection pressure on Myrmarachne for increased resemblance to a model by locomotor mimicry, despite the associated costs when faced with ant-eating predators.

The new Andean jumping spider genus Urupuyu and its placement within a revised classification of the Amycoida (Araneae: Salticidae).

Urupuyu gen. nov. is described for three new species of small black jumping spiders from the cloud forests of Ecuador: Urupuyu antisana sp. nov. (type species), U. edwardsi sp. nov., and U. occidentale sp. nov. Phylogenetic analyses with DNA sequences (28S, actin 5C, wingless, 16SND1 and CO1) indicate Urupuyu is closely related to the huriine amycoids Hurius and Scoturius, a placement also supported by morphological traits. Our phylogenetic analysis serves to clarify the relationships within the Amycoida in general, leading to our proposing a revised classification for the group, with subfamilies Gophoinae, Sitticinae, Bredinae subfam. nov., Scopocirinae, Thiodininae, Sarindinae, Huriinae, Simonellinae, and Amycinae. We confirm the marpissine-like Breda belongs within the Amycoida. The phylogeny implies that ant mimicry has evolved at least twice (simonellines and sarindines) and probably a third time (Atomosphyrus in the thiodinines) within the Amycoida. The following new synonymies are proposed for suprageneric names: Hyetusseae Simon, 1903 and Arachnomureae Mello-Leitão, 1917 = Thiodininae Simon, 1901; Zunigeae Simon, 1901 = Sarindinae Simon, 1901; Synemosynae Banks, 1892 = Simonellinae Peckham, Peckham & Wheeler, 1888; Magoninae Petrunkevitch, 1928 = Amycinae F.O.P.-Cambridge, 1900.

Antlike robots might help explain origins of cooperation

Antlike robots might help explain origins of cooperation

Castianeira furva sp. nov. (Araneae, Corinnidae, Castianeirinae), a new polymorphic ground sac spider from the southern Western Ghats of India.

The ground-dwelling, ant-mimicking corinnid spider genus Castianeira, with Castianeira rubicunda as type species, was erected by Keyserling (1879). Members of the genus are closely related to the Afrotropical genus Cambalida Simon, 1910 (Haddad 2012a) and are distributed mainly in tropical and temperate regions of the world except for Australia and nearby islands (World Spider Catalog 2015). The genus was revised from the Nearctic Region and south-east Asia (Reiskind 1969 and Deeleman-Reinhold 2001, respectively) and currently includes 126 described species, making it as the largest genus within the family Corinnidae (World Spider Catalog 2015). Even though the genus is rich in species, the validity and placement of majority of the species are still doubtful and questionable. For example, according to Haddad (2012b), many of the Afrotropical species, as well as majority of the species described from India (Haddad, pers. comm.) are misplaced or synonyms of previously described ones (e.g. Haddad 2012a, 2013a). The genus thus will remain as a trash-can until all the species described so far can be revised.

Multi-trait mimicry of ants by a parasitoid wasp.

Many animals avoid attack from predators through toxicity or the emission of repellent chemicals. Defensive mimicry has evolved in many species to deceive shared predators, for instance through colouration and other morphological adaptations, but mimicry hardly ever seems to involve multi-trait similarities. Here we report on a wingless parasitoid wasp that exhibits a full spectrum of traits mimicing ants and affording protection against ground-dwelling predators (wolf spiders). In body size, morphology and movement Gelis agilis (Ichneumonidae) is highly similar to the black garden ant (Lasius niger) that shares the same habitat. When threatened, G. agilis also emits a volatile chemical that is similar to an ant-produced chemical that repels spiders. In bioassays with L. niger, G. agilis, G. areator, Cotesia glomerata and Drosophila melanogaster, ants and G. agilis were virtually immune to spider attack, in contrast the other species were not. Volatile characterisation with gas chromatography-mass spectrometry identified G. agilis emissions as 6-methyl-5-hepten-2-one, a known insect defence semiochemical that acts as an alarm pheromone in ants. We argue that multi-trait mimicry, as observed in G. agilis, might be much more common among animals than currently realized.

Pentamyrmecini, a new tribe for Pentamyrmex spinosus, a remarkable new genus and species of Pentatomidae (Hemiptera: Heteroptera) from Thailand. [Corrected

Pentamyrmex spinosus new genus, new species is described, and a new tribe is erected for this remarkable insect. This is the first report of ant mimicry in the Pentatomidae.

A new species of ant mimicking spider, Myrmecotypus jasmineae (Araneae: Corinnidae: Castianeirinae), from Nicaragua.

Spiders of the corinnid genus Myrmecotypus Pickard-Cambridge, 1894 are known for being morphological and behavioral mimics of ants (Reiskind 1969, 1977; Cushing 1997, 2012; Rubio & Arbino 2009; Rubio et al. 2013). This genus currently includes nine species from to the New World. They occur from the United States (one species) to Argentina (one species), but most (seven species) occur from Mexico to Panama (Reiskind 1969; Rubio & Arbino 2009, Platnick 2014). A new species, M. jasmineae, from Nicaragua is described here from two males. A key to males and females of Myrmecotypus, adapted from Reiskind (1969), is modified to include all of the known species.

A phylogenetic study of the generic relationships within the subtribe Leucophoropterina Schuh (Miridae: Phylinae: Leucophoropterini)

AbstractThe subtribe Leucophoropterina (Miridae: Phylinae: Leucophoropterini) is a relatively small lineage of mirids comprising 23 genera and 104 species. Most of the species are endemic to the Indo‐Pacific and Australia, and many are considered ant mimics. A phylogenetic analysis including both the Australian and the Indo‐Pacific taxa was conducted for the first time with a dataset of 137 morphological characters coded for all but two known species of Leucophoropterina. The hypothesis by Schuh () of at least two major lineages of ant‐mimicking taxa based on his analysis of the Indo‐Pacific taxa continues to be supported with our inclusion of Australian taxa. The Australian taxa and Indo‐Pacific taxa of Leucophoropterina do not form independent, geographically based lineages, but instead comprise several lineages containing taxa from both regions. This study provides a basis for future detailed studies of biogeography and ant mimicry in the group.

Double Deception: Ant-Mimicking Spiders Elude Both Visually- and Chemically-Oriented Predators

Biological mimicry is often multimodal, in that a mimic reinforces its resemblance to another organism via different kinds of signals that can be perceived by a specific target audience. In this paper we describe a novel scenario, in which a mimic deceives at least two distinct audiences, each of which relies primarily on a different sensory modality for decision-making. We have previously shown that Peckhamia picata, a myrmecomorphic spider that morphologically and behaviorally resembles the ant Camponotus nearcticus, experiences reduced predation by visually-oriented jumping spiders. Here we report that Peckhamia also faces reduced aggression from spider-hunting sphecid wasps as well as from its model ant, both of which use chemical cues to identify prey. We also report that Peckhamia does not chemically resemble its model ants, and that its total cuticular hydrocarbons are significantly lower than those of the ants and non-mimic spiders. Although further studies are needed to clarify the basis of Peckhamia's chemically-mediated protection, to our knowledge, such ‘double deception,’ in which a single organism sends misleading visual cues to one set of predators while chemically misleading another set, has not been reported; however, it is likely to be common among what have until now been considered purely visual mimics.

Spiders (Arachnida: Araneae) from the Insect Limestone (Bembridge Marls, Late Eocene) of the Isle of Wight, southern England

ABSTRACTThe arachnids from the late Eocene Insect Limestone of the Isle of Wight are reviewed. Only spiders (Araneae) have been recorded, of which several dozen are known, mostly juveniles. Nearly all are araneomorphs; the putative mygalomorph Eoatypus woodwardii McCook, 1888 was removed from that infraorder by Selden (2001), but new specimens, yet to be described, could belong in this group. Among the adult specimens, which are thus identifiable to family level, most belong to the argyronetid water-spider Vectaraneus yulei Selden, 2001; some resemble araneids, and a small number can be referred to other families. New morphological information on the holotype of Vectaraneus is presented, and three other specimens are described in more detail here, in Segestriidae, Araneidae and Salticidae. Segestriids are nocturnal sedentary hunters living in tubular retreats in rock or bark crevices. Araneids are the archetypal weavers of orb webs. Salticids are the familiar jumping spiders; the one described here is an ant mimic. Their presence suggests a drier habitat was present somewhere in the source environment for the fossil biota, and they were probably inhabitants of the raised hammocks suggested for the Insect Bed palaeoenvironment.