Extant Suborders Research Articles

Bio Ecology of Aquatic and Semi-Aquatic Insects Of Order Coleoptera In The World

Background: Aquatic Coleoptera plays a major role in freshwater ecosystems and is regarded as an effective bioindicator. At least 23 beetle families, from three of the four extant suborders, are predominantly aquatic as adults, larvae, or both. They play important role in ecosystem functioning, nutrient cycling primary production , decomposition and materials translocation. Methods: In this study, various databases including PubMed, Web of Knowledge, Scopus, Google Scholar and sciencedirect were used. Results: Aquatic Coleoptera known as water beetles, with more than 13,000 described species, is one of the most abundant aquatic insects. Out of 4 suborders of Coleoptera, the suborder Myxophaga is truly aquatic whereas 8 of the 11 extant families of Adephaga are regarded as truly. As far as Polyphaga is concerned, the largest suborder of Coleoptera, only 13 of the 150 families are regarded as truly aquatic. Discussion and Conclusion: Water beetles, although defined by their affinity for aquatic ways of life, occupy a broad array of habitats, and have shifted secondarily back to their terrestrial roots (either as adults, larvae or both) on multiple occasions. This ecological variability coupled with repeated, parallel transitions has positioned water beetles as a premier study group for questions related to dispersal, ecological speciation, and diversification rates. The characteristics of a bioindicator are: richness and diversity species, easy handling, ecological faithfulness, fragility to small environmental changes and good organism responses, and water beetles are very integral parts of any biotic component of any water bodies or wetlands. They are indicators of ecological diversity and habitat characteristics

Odonatans in lowermost Cenomanian Kachin amber: updated review and a new hemiphlebiid damselfly

Odonatans are rare in Cretaceous amber deposits, and only four fragmentary specimens were recorded in Lebanese, Jordanian, Charentes and South Dakota ambers except for Kachin amber. This study reviewed the odonatans in lowermost Cenomanian Kachin amber and commented 11 odonatans, which were previously placed in the family level. Until now, over 350 odonatans have been found in Kachin amber, including 38 species of three extant suborders, and representing the most diverse and abundant dragonfly assemblage in amber inclusions. The dominated odonatans include the damselflies Burmahemiphlebia zhangi and Mesomegaloprepus magnificus, and the damsel-dragonfly Burmaphlebia reifi, accounting for ca. 79% of all odonatans. The Kachin odonatans include the earliest records of the damselfly Perilestidae, Platycnemididae and Platystictidae, and the youngest records of the true dragonfly Araripegomphidae and Stenophlebiidae, contributing to exploring the origination and evolution of these families.Hemiphlebiidae is the dominant family in Kachin amber, represented by the species Burmahemiphlebia zhangi with ca. 160 species been recorded. It is surprising that the hemiphlebiid damselfly is abundant, but the diversity is very low with only two species been previously reported. Herein, a new hemiphlebiid damselfly, Kachinhemiphlebia lini gen. et sp. nov., is described by the unique characters: Arc slightly distal of Ax2 in both fore- and hindwings; and a well-defined AA ending on posterior wing margin below Ax2. This is the second genus of the Hemiphlebiidae in Kachin amber.

Dwarfs under dinosaur legs: a new millipede of the order Callipodida (Diplopoda) from Cretaceous amber of Burma.

The entire Mesozoic Era is rather poor in millipede (class Diplopoda) fossils, with less than a dozen species being taxonomically described. Here, we describe the first fossil millipede of the order Callipodida, Burmanopetaluminexpectatumgen. nov. et sp. nov., found in early Cenomanian amber of Burma, 98.79±0.62 Mya. The species possesses a number of morphological traits that exclude it from all extant suborders, and Burmanopetalidea suborder nov. and Burmanopetalidae fam. nov. are here erected to accommodate it. The new suborder can be recognized by the following unique characters: pleurotergal setae absent; telson with a specific spatulate shape twice the size of the penultimate body ring; hypoproct devoid of setae; and eyes composed of five well-separated ommatidia. While the callipodidan habitus seems to have remained generally unchanged for at least 99 million years, pleurotergal and hypoproctal setation, as well as the complexity of eyes in ground-dwelling forms may have evolved recently in the order. As B.inexpectatumgen. nov. et sp. nov. is the first true callipodidan in the fossil record, the minimum age of Callipodida is thus at least 99 Mya.

At the dawn of the great rise: †Ponomarenkia belmonthensis (Insecta: Coleoptera), a remarkable new Late Permian beetle from the Southern Hemisphere

The first complete beetle body fossil from the Australian early Late Permian fossil site Belmont is described here, †Ponomarenkia belmonthensis sp. nov., attributed to a new extinct family †Ponomarenkiidae. Shortly before a dramatic biodiversity crisis at the end of the Palaeozoic, it documents profound transitions in the evolution of Coleoptera, today by far the most species-rich group of insects and the largest order of organisms. †Ponomarenkia displays transitional states of several important characters, excluding it from the ancestral earliest stem-group coleopterans (e.g. †Tshecardocoleidae), but also from the four ‘modern’ extant suborders. In contrast to †Tshecardocoleidae, †Permocupedidae and †Rhomboleidae, it lacks the ancestral very broad and apically truncated prosternal process and a broad prothoracic postcoxal bridge, features suggesting a position in Coleoptera sensu stricto, i.e. the crown group of beetles. However, it does not share apomorphic features with extant Archostemata (e.g. narrowed neck region), Polyphaga (e.g. internalized propleura), Adephaga (e.g. elongated metacoxae with strongly developed metacoxal plates) or Myxophaga (broadly separated mesocoxae). †Ponomarenkia likely belongs in the stem group of one of the extant suborders or in the stem group of a clade comprising more than one of them.http://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:BEC74A0C-C902-4326-8549-7F5D5E99E0C3

Ademosynidae (Insecta: Coleoptera): A new concept for a coleopteran key taxon and its phylogenetic affinities to the extant suborders

Ademosynidae (Insecta: Coleoptera): A new concept for a coleopteran key taxon and its phylogenetic affinities to the extant suborders

The fossil record and macroevolutionary history of the beetles.

Coleoptera (beetles) is the most species-rich metazoan order, with approximately 380 000 species. To understand how they came to be such a diverse group, we compile a database of global fossil beetle occurrences to study their macroevolutionary history. Our database includes 5553 beetle occurrences from 221 fossil localities. Amber and lacustrine deposits preserve most of the beetle diversity and abundance. All four extant suborders are found in the fossil record, with 69% of all beetle families and 63% of extant beetle families preserved. Considerable focus has been placed on beetle diversification overall, however, for much of their evolutionary history it is the clade Polyphaga that is most responsible for their taxonomic richness. Polyphaga had an increase in diversification rate in the Early Cretaceous, but instead of being due to the radiation of the angiosperms, this was probably due to the first occurrences of beetle-bearing amber deposits in the record. Perhaps, most significant is that polyphagan beetles had a family-level extinction rate of zero for most of their evolutionary history, including across the Cretaceous-Palaeogene boundary. Therefore, focusing on the factors that have inhibited beetle extinction, as opposed to solely studying mechanisms that may promote speciation, should be examined as important determinants of their great diversity today.

A revised dated phylogeny of the arachnid order Opiliones.

Dating the Opiliones tree of life has become an important enterprise for this group of arthropods, due to their ancient origins and important biogeographic implications. To incorporate both methodological innovations in molecular dating as well as new systematic discoveries of harvestman diversity, we conducted total evidence dating on a data set uniting morphological and/or molecular sequence data for 47 Opiliones species, including all four well-known Palaeozoic fossils, to test the placement of both fossils and newly discovered lineages in a single analysis. Furthermore, we investigated node dating with a phylogenomic data set of 24,202 amino acid sites for 14 species of Opiliones, sampling all extant suborders. In this way, we approached molecular dating of basal harvestman phylogeny using different data sets and approaches to assess congruence of divergence time estimates. In spite of the markedly different composition of data sets, our results show congruence across all analyses for age estimates of basal nodes that are well constrained with respect to fossil calibrations (e.g., Opiliones, Palpatores). By contrast, derived nodes that lack fossil calibrations (e.g., the suborders Cyphophthalmi, and Laniatores) have large uncertainty intervals in diversification times, particularly in the total evidence dating analysis, reflecting the dearth of calibration points and undersampling of derived lineages. Total evidence dating consistently produced older median ages than node dating for ingroup nodes, due to the nested placement of multiple Palaeozoic fossils. Our analyses support basal diversification of Opiliones in the Ordovician-Devonian period, corroborating the inferred ancient origins of this arthropod order, and underscore the importance of diversity discovery—both paleontological and neontological—in evolutionary inference.

A Paleozoic Stem Group to Mite Harvestmen Revealed through Integration of Phylogenetics and Development

Successfully placing fossils in phylogenies is integral to understanding the tree of life. Crown-group Paleozoic members of the arachnid order Opiliones are indicative of ancient origins and one of the earliest arthropod terrestrialization events [1, 2]. Opiliones epitomize morphological stasis, and all known fossils have been placed within the four extant suborders [3-5]. Here we report a Carboniferous harvestman species, Hastocularis argusgen. nov., sp. nov., reconstructed with microtomography (microCT). Phylogenetic analysis recovers this species, and the Devonian Eophalangium sheari, as members of an extinct harvestman clade. We establish the suborder Tetrophthalmi subordo nov., which bore four eyes, to accommodate H.argus and E.sheari, the latter previously considered to be a phalangid [6-9]. Furthermore, embryonic gene expression in the extant species Phalangium opilio demonstrates vestiges of lateral eye tubercles. These lateral eyes are lost in all crown-group Phalangida, but are observed in both our fossil and outgroup chelicerate orders. These data independently corroborate the diagnosis of two eye pairs in the fossil and demonstrate retention of eyes of separate evolutionary origins in modern harvestmen [10-12]. The discovery of Tetrophthalmi alters molecular divergence time estimates, supporting Carboniferous rather than Devonian diversification for extant suborders and directly impacting inferences of terrestrialization history and biogeography. Multidisciplinary approaches integrating fossil and neontological data increase confidence in phylogenies and elucidate evolutionary history.

THE EVOLUTIONARY HISTORY OF CETACEAN BRAIN AND BODY SIZE

Cetaceans rival primates in brain size relative to body size and include species with the largest brains and biggest bodies to have ever evolved. Cetaceans are remarkably diverse, varying in both phenotypes by several orders of magnitude, with notable differences between the two extant suborders, Mysticeti and Odontoceti. We analyzed the evolutionary history of brain and body mass, and relative brain size measured by the encephalization quotient (EQ), using a data set of extinct and extant taxa to capture temporal variation in the mode and direction of evolution. Our results suggest that cetacean brain and body mass evolved under strong directional trends to increase through time, but decreases in EQ were widespread. Mysticetes have significantly lower EQs than odontocetes due to a shift in brain:body allometry following the divergence of the suborders, caused by rapid increases in body mass in Mysticeti and a period of body mass reduction in Odontoceti. The pattern in Cetacea contrasts with that in primates, which experienced strong trends to increase brain mass and relative brain size, but not body mass. We discuss what these analyses reveal about the convergent evolution of large brains, and highlight that until recently the most encephalized mammals were odontocetes, not primates.

Structure and localization of sensilla on antennae of caddisflies (Insecta: Trichoptera)

The structures of antennal segments and ultrastructures of antennal sensilla were studied in representatives of 28 families of caddisflies from both extant suborders by the methods of light and scanning electron microscopy. Sixteen types of the sensilla have been found to occur on the antenna in Trichoptera; some of them were found for the first time. Morphological characters of the cuticular structures on the antennal surface demonstrate the significant structural differences both in various families and in the lower taxonomy levels. Specialized sensory fields differing structurally from the rest of the flagellomer surface have been found on the antennas in the suborder Phryganeina. A modified classification of sensilla based on the cuticular structures is proposed.

Evolutionary changes of the importance of olfaction in cetaceans based on the olfactory marker protein gene

Odontocetes and mysticetes are two extant suborders of cetaceans. It is reported that the former have no sense of olfaction, while the latter can smell in air. To explain the ecological reason why mysticetes still retain their sense of smell, two hypotheses have been proposed — the echolocation-priority hypothesis, which assumes that the acquisition of echolocation causes the reduction of the importance of olfaction, and the filter-feeder hypothesis, which assumes that olfactory ability is important for filter-feeders to locate their prey because clouds of plankton give off a peculiar odor. The olfactory marker protein (OMP) is almost exclusively expressed in vertebrate olfactory receptor neurons, and is considered to play important roles in olfactory systems. In this study, full-length open reading frames of OMP genes were identified in 6 cetacean species and we analyzed the nonsynonymous to synonymous substitution rate ratio based on the maximum likelihood method. The evolutionary changes of the selective pressures on OMP genes did fit better to the filter-feeder hypothesis than to the echolocation-priority hypothesis. In addition, no pseudogenization mutations are found in all five odontocetes OMP genes investigated in this study. It may suggest that OMP retains some function even in ‘anosmic’ odontocetes.

Erratum

CladisticsVolume 25, Issue 2 p. 209-209 Free Access Erratum This article corrects the following: The thoracic morphology of Archostemata and the relationships of the extant suborders of Coleoptera (Hexapoda) Frank Friedrich, Brian D. Farrell, Rolf G. Beutel, Volume 25Issue 1Cladistics pages: 1-37 First Published online: November 28, 2008 First published: 08 April 2009 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1096-0031.2009.00257.xCitations: 1AboutSectionsPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Due to an oversight in the production of Friedrich et al. (2009), the wrong Fig. 3 was published. The correct figure and its caption are reproduced below. The publishers apologise for any confusion caused. Figure 3Open in figure viewerPowerPoint Scanning electron micrographs, pro-mesothoracic interlocking device of Tetraphalerus bruchii. (A) Posterolateral edge of pronotum, ventral view; (B) posterior propleural protrusion, dorsomedian view; (C,D) anterior region of mesanepisternum; (C) lateral view (concavity of mesanepisternum outlined), (D) ventral view. aest2, mesanepisternum; apc2, mesothoracic anapleural cleft; c1/2, articulary cavity of joint 1/2; cx1, procoxa; ep2, mesepimeron; nt1, pronotum; p1/2, articulary process of joint 1/2; pl1, propleura; pls2, mesothoracic pleural suture; ppp, posteriorpropleural protrusion; v2, mesoventrite. Scale bar: (A) 100 μm, (B,C) 50 μm. Reference Friedrich, F., Farrell, B.D., Beutel, R.G., 2009. The thoracic morphology of Archostemata and the relationships of the extant suborders of Coleoptera (Hexapoda). Cladistics 25, 1– 37. Wiley Online LibraryPubMedWeb of Science®Google Scholar Citing Literature Volume25, Issue2April 2009Pages 209-209 FiguresReferencesRelatedInformation

Skeletal ultrastructure and phylogeny of cyclostome bryozoans

Recent research on the ultrastructure of the calcareous skeleton in the bryozoan order Cyclostomata is summarized and updated, based on field emission SEM studies of 87 species. Six fundamental ultrastructural fabrics are recognized which differ in the crystallographic orientations, shapes and prevailing growth directions of the constituent crystallites. During the growth of individual walls a succession of fabrics is secreted, defining a fabric suite. Five fabric suites are described in interior walls and four in exterior walls. Nine ultrastructural characters were combined with 37 other skeletal characters in a PAUP analysis of the relationships between 28 post-Palaeozoic cyclostomes chosen to include representatives of all suborders. A single tree of length 142 steps was found. Comparison of tree statistics for three categories of characters showed ultrastructural characters to be more homoplastic than zooidal characters, and the latter more homoplastic than colonial characters. Rooting the tree on the paleotubuliporine Cuffeyella gave four transitions from fixed- to free-walled organization and no reversals. With respect to the five extant suborders of cyclostomes, this first, preliminary analysis implies that Rectangulata and Cancellata are monophyletic groups, whereas Articulata are diphyletic, and both Tubuliporina and Cerioporina paraphyletic.

Skeletal ultrastructure and phylogeny of cyclostome bryozoans

Recent research on the ultrastructure of the calcareous skeleton in the bryozoan order Cyclostomata is summarized and updated, based on field emission SEM studies of 87 species. Six fundamental ultrastructural fabrics are recognized which differ in the crystallographic orientations, shapes and prevailing growth directions of the constituent crystallites. During the growth of individual walls a succession of fabrics is secreted, defining a fabric suite. Five fabric suites are described in interior walls and four in exterior walls. Nine ultrastructural characters were combined with 37 other skeletal characters in a PAUP analysis of the relationships between 28 post-Palaeozoic cyclostomes chosen to include representatives of all suborders. A single tree of length 142 steps was found. Comparison of tree statistics for three categories of characters showed ultrastructural characters to be more homoplastic than zooidal characters, and the latter more homoplastic than colonial characters. Rooting the tree on the paleotubuliporine Cuffeyella gave four transitions from fixed- to free-walled organization and no reversals. With respect to the five extant suborders of cyclostomes, this first, preliminary analysis implies that Rectangulata and Cancellata are monophyletic groups, whereas Articulata are diphyletic, and both Tubuliporina and Cerioporina paraphyletic.

Phylogenetic system and zoogeography of the Plecoptera.

Information about the phylogenetic relationships of Plecoptera is summarized. The few characters supporting monophyly of the order are outlined. Several characters of possible significance for the search for the closest relatives of the stoneflies are discussed, but the sister-group of the order remains unknown. Numerous characters supporting the presently recognized phylogenetic system of Plecoptera are presented, alternative classifications are discussed, and suggestions for future studies are made. Notes on zoogeography are appended. The order as such is old (Permian fossils), but phylogenetic relationships and global distribution patterns suggest that evolution of the extant suborders started with the breakup of Pangaea. There is evidence of extensive recent speciation in all parts of the world.

Is the guinea-pig ( Cavia porcellus) a rodent?

The Rodentia are traditionally divided into three extant suborders: the Sciuromorpha, the Myomorpha and the Hystricomorpha. The guinea-pig ( Cavia porcellus) has been classified as a New World hystricomorph rodent. On the basis of the analysis of our previous studies on mammalian alanine:glyoxylate aminotransferase 1, we propose that the classification of the guinea-pig as a rodent is not correct.