Taxonomic Coverage Research Articles

Invasive alien insects represent a clear but variable threat to biodiversity

Invasive alien insects are an important yet understudied component of the general threat that biological invasions pose to biodiversity. We quantified the breadth and level of this threat by performing environmental impact assessments using a modified version of the Environmental Impact Assessment for Alien Taxa (EICAT) framework. This represents the largest effort to date on quantify the environmental impacts of invasive alien insects. Using a relatively large and taxonomically representative set of insect species that have established non-native populations around the globe, we tested hypotheses on: (1) socioeconomic and (2) taxonomic biases, (3) relationship between range size and impact severity and (4) island susceptibility. Socioeconomic pests had marginally more environmental impact information than non-pests and, as expected, impact information was geographically and taxonomically skewed. Species with larger introduced ranges were more likely, on average, to have the most severe local environmental impacts (i.e. a global maximum impact severity of ‘Major’). The island susceptibility hypothesis found no support, and both island and mainland systems experience similar numbers of high severity impacts. These results demonstrate the high variability, both within and across species, in the ways and extents to which invasive insects impact biodiversity, even within the highest profile invaders. However, the environmental impact knowledge base requires greater taxonomic and geographic coverage, so that hypotheses about invasion impact can be developed towards identifying generalities in the biogeography of invasion impacts.

Hooking the scientific community on thorny-headed worms: interesting and exciting facts, knowledge gaps and perspectives for research directions on Acanthocephala.

Although interest in Acanthocephala seems to have reached only a small community of researchers worldwide, we show in this opinion article that this group of parasites is composed of excellent model organisms for studying key questions in parasite molecular biology and cytogenetics, evolutionary ecology, and ecotoxicology. Their shared ancestry with free-living rotifers makes them an ideal group to explore the origins of the parasitic lifestyle and evolutionary drivers of host shifts and environmental transitions. They also provide useful features in the quest to decipher the proximate mechanisms of parasite-induced phenotypic alterations and better understand the evolution of behavioral manipulation. From an applied perspective, acanthocephalans' ability to accumulate contaminants offers useful opportunities to monitor the impacts - and evaluate the possible mitigation - of anthropogenic pollutants on aquatic fauna and develop the environmental parasitology framework. However, exploring these exciting research avenues will require connecting fragmentary knowledge by enlarging the taxonomic coverage of molecular and phenotypic data. In this opinion paper, we highlight the needs and opportunities of research on Acanthocephala in three main directions: (i) integrative taxonomy (including non-molecular tools) and phylogeny-based comparative analysis; (ii) ecology and evolution of life cycles, transmission strategies and host ranges; and (iii) environmental issues related to global changes, including ecotoxicology. In each section, the most promising ideas and developments are presented based on selected case studies, with the goal that the present and future generations of parasitologists further explore and increase knowledge of Acanthocephala.

Open and reusable annotated mass spectrometry dataset of a chemodiverse collection of 1,600 plant extracts.

As privileged structures, natural products often display potent biological activities. However, the discovery of novel bioactive scaffolds is often hampered by the chemical complexity of the biological matrices they are found in. Large natural extract collections are thus extremely valuable for their chemical novelty potential but also complicated to exploit in the frame of drug-discovery projects. In the end, it is the pure chemical substances that are desired for structural determination purposes and bioactivity evaluation. Researchers interested in the exploration of large and chemodiverse extract collections should thus establish strategies aiming to efficiently tackle such chemical complexity and access these structures. Establishing carefully crafted digital layers documenting the spectral and chemical complexity as well as bioactivity results of natural extracts collections can help prioritize time-consuming but mandatory isolation efforts. In this note, we report the results of our initial exploration of a collection of 1,600 plant extracts in the frame of a drug-discovery effort. After describing the taxonomic coverage of this collection, we present the results of its liquid chromatography high-resolution mass spectrometric profiling and the exploitation of these profiles using computational solutions. The resulting annotated mass spectral dataset and associated chemical and taxonomic metadata are made available to the community, and data reuse cases are proposed. We are currently continuing our exploration of this plant extract collection for drug-discovery purposes (notably looking for novel antitrypanosomatids, anti-infective and prometabolic compounds) and ecometabolomics insights. We believe that such a dataset can be exploited and reused by researchers interested in computational natural products exploration.

Examining the representation of locally threatened species in North American zoos

AbstractA perceived dissonance exists between the stated conservation mission of modern zoos and the composition of species in their care. A bias toward charismatic taxa over threatened ones has been demonstrated in several studies. However, these prior examinations have principally relied on species threat status derived from global lists, and threat status reported for species on national and subnational lists often differ from global assessments. It has been suggested that some globally non‐threatened species maintained in zoos might fulfill local conservation priorities. In this study, we compare local threat status and zoo population size for native bird, mammal, reptile and amphibian species in North American zoos to assess the representation of locally threatened taxa. We found that native locally threatened species were kept in North American zoos slightly less than would be expected by chance; however, of the species that were represented in zoos, those that were threatened in more of the subnational regions where they occurred averaged larger populations within zoos. This suggests that the direct contribution from zoo animals to the conservation of locally threatened species is relatively limited with respect to taxonomic coverage, but this contribution may be underestimated by strictly counting the threatened species kept in zoos.

Distinct latitudinal community patterns of Arctic marine vertebrates along the East Greenlandic coast detected by environmental DNA

AbstractAimGreenland is one of the places on Earth where the effects of climate change are most evident. The retreat of sea ice has made East Greenland more accessible for longer periods during the year. East Greenland fjords have been notoriously difficult to study due to their remoteness, dense sea ice conditions and lack of infrastructure. As a result, biological monitoring across latitudinal gradients is scarce in East Greenland and relies on sporadic research cruises and trawl data from commercial vessels. We here aim to investigate the transition in fish and marine mammal communities from South to Northeast Greenland using environmental DNA (eDNA).LocationSouth to Northeast Greenland.MethodsWe investigated the transition in fish and marine mammal communities from South to Northeast Greenland using eDNA metabarcoding of seawater samples. We included both surface and mesopelagic samples, collected over approximately 2400 km waterway distance, by sampling from Cape Farewell to Ella Island in August 2021.ResultsWe demonstrate a clear transition in biological communities from south to northeast, with detected fish and mammal species matching known distributions. Samples from the southern areas were dominated by capelin (Mallotus villosus) and redfish (Sebastes), whereas northeastern samples were dominated by polar cod (Boreogadus saida), sculpins (Myoxocephalus) and ringed seal (Pusa hispida). We provide newly generated 12S rRNA barcodes from 87 fish species, bringing the public DNA database closer to full taxonomic coverage for Greenlandic fish species for this locus.Main ConclusionsOur results demonstrate that eDNA sampling can detect latitudinal shifts in marine biological communities of the Arctic region, which can supplement traditional fish surveys in understanding species distributions and community compositions of marine vertebrates. Importantly, sampling of eDNA can be a feasible approach for detecting northward range expansions in remote areas as climate change progresses.

High-Throughput DNA Metabarcoding as an Approach for Ichthyoplankton Survey in Oujiang River Estuary, China

High-throughput DNA metabarcoding of mitochondrial 12S rRNA and Cyt b gene sequences was coupled with a morphology-based identification tool to assess ichthyoplankton community structure in Oujiang River Estuary, China. The performances of 12S and Cyt b barcoding markers were compared in terms of taxonomic resolution, detection and coverage, and their suitability was established for use as a quick and powerful ichthyoplankton assessment tool. A total of 30,138 ichthyoplankton (2462 eggs and 27,676 larvae) samples were collected from April to August 2015 and identified to 145 taxa belonging to 57 families and 105 genera. June and July were the main spawning months. Ichthyoplankton were more abundant around Lingkun and Qidu Islands and the upper parts of Oujiang River Estuary. The 12S gene marker presented higher species coverage and detection rate than Cyt b. DNA metabarcoding exhibited more representative species identification power than morphology. The findings reported in this study provided a key attempt towards the development of time-efficient and cost-effective ichthyoplankton identification and assessment tool.

Quantifying and mapping species threat abatement opportunities to support national target setting.

The successful implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity's post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework will rely on effective translation of targets from global to national level and increased engagement across diverse sectors of society. Species conservation targets require policy support measures that can be applied to a diversity of taxonomic groups, that link action targets to outcome goals, and that can be applied to both global and national data sets to account for national context, which the species threat abatement and restoration (STAR) metric does. To test the flexibility of STAR, we applied the metric to vascular plants listed on national red lists of Brazil, Norway, and South Africa. The STAR metric uses data on species' extinction risk, distributions, and threats, which we obtained from national red lists to quantify the contribution that threat abatement and habitat restoration activities could make to reducing species' extinction risk. Across all 3 countries, the greatest opportunity for reducing plant species' extinction risk was from abating threats from agricultural activities, which could reduce species' extinction risk by 54% in Norway, 36% in South Africa, and 29% in Brazil. Species extinction risk could be reduced by a further 21% in South Africa by abating threats from invasive species and by 21% in Brazil by abating threats from urban expansion. Even with different approaches to red-listing among countries, the STAR metric yielded informative results that identified where the greatest conservation gains could be made for species through threat-abatement and restoration activities. Quantifiably linking local taxonomic coverage and data collection to global processes with STAR would allow national target setting to align with global targets and enable state and nonstate actors to measure and report on their potential contributions to species conservation.

Digitisation of the Natural History Museum's collection of Dalbergia, Pterocarpus and the subtribe Phaseolinae (Fabaceae, Faboideae).

In 2018, the Natural History Museum (NHMUK, herbarium code: BM) undertook a pilot digitisation project together with the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew (project Lead) and the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh to collectively digitise non-type herbarium material of the subtribe Phaseolinae and the genera Dalbergia L.f. and Pterocarpus Jacq. (rosewoods and padauk), all from the economically important family of legumes (Leguminosae or Fabaceae).These taxonomic groups were chosen to provide specimen data for two potential use cases: 1) to support the development of dry beans as a sustainable and resilient crop; 2) to aid conservation and sustainable use of rosewoods and padauk. Collectively, these use case studies support the aims of the UK's Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA)-allocated, Official Development Assistance (ODA) funding. We present the images and metadata for 11,222 NHMUK specimens. The metadata includes label transcription and georeferencing, along with summary data on geographic, taxonomic, collector and temporal coverage. We also provide timings and the methodology for our transcription and georeferencing protocols. Approximately 35% of specimens digitised were collected in ODA-listed countries, in tropical Africa, but also in South East Asia and South America.

Conservation and the genomics of populations, 3rd edition, Allendorf F. W., Funk W. C., Aitken S. N., Byrne M., Luikart G.

Conservation and the genomics of populations, 3rd edition, Allendorf F. W., Funk W. C., Aitken S. N., Byrne M., Luikart G.

Evidence-based guidelines for automated conservation assessments of plant species.

Assessing species' extinction risk is vital to setting conservation priorities. However, assessment endeavors, such as those used to produce the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, have significant gaps in taxonomic coverage. Automated assessment (AA) methods are gaining popularity to fill these gaps. Choices made in developing, using, and reporting results of AA methods could hinder their successful adoption or lead to poor allocation of conservation resources. We explored how choice of data cleaning type and level, taxonomic group, training sample, and automation method affect performance of threat status predictions for plant species. We used occurrences from the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) to generate assessments for species in 3 taxonomic groups based on 6 different occurrence-based AA methods. We measured each method's performance and coverage following increasingly stringent occurrence cleaning. Automatically cleaned data from GBIF performed comparably to occurrence records cleaned manually by experts. However, all types of data cleaning limited the coverage of AAs. Overall, machine-learning-based methods performed well across taxa, even with minimal data cleaning. Results suggest a machine-learning-based method applied to minimally cleaned data offers the best compromise between performance and species coverage. However, optimal data cleaning, training sample, and automation methods depend on the study group, intended applications, and expertise.

Modular, multi‐barcode amplicon sequencing for improved species‐level detection of fungal phytopathogens: A case study of pipeline establishment targeting the Ophiostomatales

AbstractRecent advances in the field of environmental DNA (eDNA) metabarcoding have produced a promising platform for early detection and broad‐spectrum monitoring of plant pests and pathogens. To date, the majority of fungal metabarcoding assays have relied upon universal primers amplifying segments of the ribosomal DNA, to ensure broad taxonomic coverage while studying changes in community composition, or more recently, to screen for presence/absence of target species. In a diagnostics framework however, single, universal molecular barcodes do not discriminate accurately enough for many groups of important fungal phytopathogens at the required species level. Here, a modular, multi‐barcode amplicon sequencing pipeline was established to provide rapid and reliable diagnostics targeting the Ophiostomatales, an order containing economically important phytopathogens vectored by bark and ambrosia beetles (Curculionidae). Using compositionally varied mock communities, we evaluated five barcoding loci: ITS1, ITS2, the large ribosomal sub‐unit (LSU), translation elongation factor 1‐alpha (TEF1α) and calmodulin (CAL), for their ability to provide species‐level resolution. The sensitivity and detection limit of the assay was established by spiking genomic DNA of the exotic Dutch elm disease pathogen, Ophiostoma novo‐ulmi Brasier, into both the controlled mock communities and eDNA sampled from Ips grandicollis (Eichhoff) beetles collected in New South Wales, Australia. The TEF1α barcode successfully detected the Dutch elm pathogen DNA with 100% accuracy down to approx. 5 pg/μl, while the ITS1 barcode had a 100% accuracy down to approx. 0.4 pg/μl within a given sample. Our results demonstrate that a dual‐barcode approach targeting the ITS1 and TEF1α regions simultaneously is sufficient for accurate species level detection and characterisation of the Ophiostomatales and offers confident detection of low‐abundance taxa (relative read abundances of 0.1%–0.01%). Multi‐barcode metabarcoding provides a framework which can quickly and efficiently be adapted to new targets when establishing high throughput diagnostics for post‐border biosecurity surveillance of fungal phytopathogens.

Biodiversity outcomes of nature-based solutions for climate change adaptation: Characterising the evidence base

Nature-based solutions (NbS) are increasingly recognised for their potential to address both the climate and biodiversity crises. Both these outcomes rely on the capacity of NbS to support and enhance the health of an ecosystem: its biodiversity, the condition of its abiotic and biotic elements, and its capacity to continue to function despite environmental change. However, while understanding of ecosystem health outcomes of NbS for climate change mitigation has developed in recent years, the outcomes of those implemented for adaptation remain poorly understood. To address this, we systematically reviewed the outcomes of 109 nature-based interventions for climate change adaptation using 33 indicators of ecosystem health across eight broad categories (e.g., diversity, biomass, ecosystem composition). We showed that 88% of interventions with reported positive outcomes for climate change adaptation also reported benefits for ecosystem health. We also showed that interventions were associated with a 67% average increase in species richness. All eight studies that reported benefits for both climate change mitigation and adaptation also supported ecosystem health, leading to a “triple win.” However, there were also trade-offs, mainly for forest management and creation of novel ecosystems such as monoculture plantations of non-native species. Our review highlights two key limitations in our understanding of the outcomes of NbS for ecosystem health. First, a limited selection of metrics are used and these rarely include key aspects such as functional diversity and habitat connectivity. Second, taxonomic coverage is limited: 50% of interventions only had evidence for effects on plants, and 57% of outcomes did not distinguish between native and non-native species. We make suggestions of how to improve assessments of the ecosystem health outcomes of NbS, as well as policy recommendations to enable the upscaling of NbS that support flourishing and resilient ecosystems, and are effective in addressing both climate and biodiversity goals.

New Knowledge on Distribution and Abundance of Toxic Microalgal Species and Related Toxins in the Northwestern Black Sea.

Numerous potentially toxic plankton species commonly occur in the Black Sea, and phycotoxins have been reported. However, the taxonomy, phycotoxin profiles, and distribution of harmful microalgae in the basin are still understudied. An integrated microscopic (light microscopy) and molecular (18S rRNA gene metabarcoding and qPCR) approach complemented with toxin analysis was applied at 41 stations in the northwestern part of the Black Sea for better taxonomic coverage and toxin profiling in natural populations. The combined dataset included 20 potentially toxic species, some of which (Dinophysis acuminata, Dinophysis acuta, Gonyaulax spinifera, and Karlodinium veneficum) were detected in over 95% of the stations. In parallel, pectenotoxins (PTX-2 as a major toxin) were registered in all samples, and yessotoxins were present at most of the sampling points. PTX-1 and PTX-13, as well as some YTX variants, were recorded for the first time in the basin. A positive correlation was found between the cell abundance of Dinophysis acuta and pectenotoxins, and between Lingulodinium polyedra and Protoceratium reticulatum and yessotoxins. Toxic microalgae and toxin variant abundance and spatial distribution was associated with environmental parameters. Despite the low levels of the identified phycotoxins and their low oral toxicity, chronic toxic exposure could represent an ecosystem and human health hazard.

Focal vs. fecal: Seasonal variation in the diet of wild vervet monkeys from observational and DNA metabarcoding data.

Assessing the diet of wild animals reveals valuable information about their ecology and trophic relationships that may help elucidate dynamic interactions in ecosystems and forecast responses to environmental changes. Advances in molecular biology provide valuable research tools in this field. However, comparative empirical research is still required to highlight strengths and potential biases of different approaches. Therefore, this study compares environmental DNA and observational methods for the same study population and sampling duration. We employed DNA metabarcoding assays targeting plant and arthropod diet items in 823 fecal samples collected over 12 months in a wild population of an omnivorous primate, the vervet monkey (Chlorocebus pygerythrus). DNA metabarcoding data were subsequently compared to direct observations. We observed the same seasonal patterns of plant consumption with both methods; however, DNA metabarcoding showed considerably greater taxonomic coverage and resolution compared to observations, mostly due to the construction of a local plant DNA database. We found a strong effect of season on variation in plant consumption largely shaped by the dry and wet seasons. The seasonal effect on arthropod consumption was weaker, but feeding on arthropods was more frequent in spring and summer, showing overall that vervets adapt their diet according to available resources. The DNA metabarcoding assay outperformed also direct observations of arthropod consumption in both taxonomic coverage and resolution. Combining traditional techniques and DNA metabarcoding data can therefore not only provide enhanced assessments of complex diets and trophic interactions to the benefit of wildlife conservationists and managers but also opens new perspectives for behavioral ecologists studying whether diet variation in social species is induced by environmental differences or might reflect selective foraging behaviors.

Species diversity and DNA barcode library of freshwater Molluscs of South Caucasus.

This study provides the first attempt to investigate the molecular diversity of South Caucasian freshwater molluscs (Mollusca, Gastropoda) and lay down the first bricks to build up a DNA-barcode library. In total, 289 COI barcode sequences were obtained from 33 morpho-species belonging to 24 molluscan genera and 10 families that represent nearly 30% of known freshwater molluscan diversity of the South Caucasus region. DNA barcodes were analysed by means of the Barcode Index Number (BIN) and the other tools available in BOLD Systems. Results showed that the knowledge of freshwater molluscs diversity in the South Caucasus is far from comprehensive. For the studied 33 morpho-species, 289 barcodes were clustered into 40 BINs, from which unique BINs were defined for 12 species and five species were characterised with more than a single BIN. From the studied taxa, 60% were characterised larger than 2.2% sequence divergence indicating high genetic variation or cryptic diversity. Within our limited taxonomic coverage, we found one new species for the Republic of Georgia (Galbaschirazensis) and at least three undescribed species belonging to the genera Stagnicola, Segmentina and Anisus. Uniqueness and high molecular diversity of the studied species emphasise the need for further intensive morphological and molecular investigations of the South Caucasian freshwater molluscan fauna.

Catalyzing Red List Assessments of Underrepresented Taxa through Partner Networks and Student Engagement

Global biodiversity decline is continuing largely unabated. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species (hereafter, Red List) provides us with the gold standard for assessments, but taxonomic coverage, especially for invertebrates and fungi, remains very low. Many players contribute to the Red List knowledge base, especially IUCN Red List partners, IUCN-led assessment projects, and the Specialist Groups and Red List Authorities (RLA) of the IUCN Species Survival Commission. However, it is vital that we develop the next generation of contributors and bring in new, diverse voices to build capacity and to sustain the huge assessment effort required to fill data gaps. Here, we discuss a recently established partner network to build additional capacity for species assessments, by linking academia directly into the assessment processes run by Specialist Groups and RLAs. We aim to increase Red List “literacy” amongst potential future conservationists and help students to increase publication output, form professional networks, and develop writing and research skills. Professors can build Red List learning into their teaching and offer Red Listing opportunities to students as assignments or research projects that directly contribute to the Red List. We discuss the opportunities presented by the approach, especially for underrepresented species groups, and the challenges that remain.

Floristics in Mexico today: insights into a better understanding of biodiversity in a megadiverse country

Advancing our current knowledge on floristic richness in Mexico requires access to different sources, including published and unpublished inventories, fascicles of ongoing floristic projects, and publicly available online databases. The evaluation of these sources reveals how extensive the information available on the country’s floristic diversity is, its heterogeneity, and the lack of protocols and standards for its proper organization, analysis, and synthesis. This review addresses the extent to which these sources of information provide the basis to achieve the long-awaited goal of completing the Flora of Mexico, and how traditional outputs of taxonomic work (Floras and checklists) are useful to other fields of biological research. We identified major knowledge gaps, as well as actual and potential uses by other scholars and the public. Although all reviewed sources focus on a better knowledge of the Mexican plant species, each one has its own approach, geographic coverage, and objectives, producing incompatibilities that hamper their integration for rapid and efficient synthesis and analysis. Such integration should offer an updated scenario of its taxonomic and geographical coverage, setting the foundations for organized protocols and strategies aimed to complete the Flora of Mexico in the short term. Floristic knowledge for the country continues to advance actively, as indicated by the growing number of floristic inventories and the buildup of online databases. This synthesis shows how much we know today about Mexico’s vascular plant richness and highlights the relevance of this knowledge to other fields of study of nature, particularly those related to its plant component.

An artificial intelligence model to identify snakes from across the world: Opportunities and challenges for global health and herpetology.

BackgroundSnakebite envenoming is a neglected tropical disease that kills an estimated 81,000 to 138,000 people and disables another 400,000 globally every year. The World Health Organization aims to halve this burden by 2030. To achieve this ambitious goal, we need to close the data gap in snake ecology and snakebite epidemiology and give healthcare providers up-to-date knowledge and access to better diagnostic tools. An essential first step is to improve the capacity to identify biting snakes taxonomically. The existence of AI-based identification tools for other animals offers an innovative opportunity to apply machine learning to snake identification and snakebite envenoming, a life-threatening situation.MethodologyWe developed an AI model based on Vision Transformer, a recent neural network architecture, and a comprehensive snake photo dataset of 386,006 training photos covering 198 venomous and 574 non-venomous snake species from 188 countries. We gathered photos from online biodiversity platforms (iNaturalist and HerpMapper) and a photo-sharing site (Flickr).Principal findingsThe model macro-averaged F1 score, which reflects the species-wise performance as averaging performance for each species, is 92.2%. The accuracy on a species and genus level is 96.0% and 99.0%, respectively. The average accuracy per country is 94.2%. The model accurately classifies selected venomous and non-venomous lookalike species from Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.ConclusionsTo our knowledge, this model’s taxonomic and geographic coverage and performance are unprecedented. This model could provide high-speed and low-cost snake identification to support snakebite victims and healthcare providers in low-resource settings, as well as zoologists, conservationists, and nature lovers from across the world.

P‐Mentha‐1,3‐dien‐9‐ol: A novel aggregation‐sex pheromone for monitoring longhorn beetles (Cerambycidae) in Eurasia and North America

AbstractLonghorn beetles (Cerambycidae) are a diverse family of beetles that can cause considerable damage as forest pests and vectors of pathogens, as well as being important components of forest food webs and ecosystem functionality. In recent years, numerous cerambycid pheromones have been identified, revealing some broad general patterns in functionality in terms of sex or aggregation‐sex pheromones in different subfamilies and different types of compounds characterizing the pheromones of various cerambycid taxa. Here, we describe the identification of the aggregation‐sex pheromones of the Eurasian longhorn beetle Aromia moschata moschata (L.) (Cerambycinae; tribe Callichromatini) and the North American species Holopleura marginata LeConte (Cerambycinae; Holopleurini), as part of an ongoing effort to extend the taxonomic coverage of identified cerambycid pheromones and to expand the prospects for cerambycid monitoring into the study of biodiversity and ecosystem services. Both species were found to use the novel pheromone compound p‐mentha‐1,3‐dien‐9‐ol, which also attracted significant numbers of the longhorn beetle Xestoleptura crassipes (LeConte) (Lepturinae; Lepturini) in trials in California. p‐Mentha‐1,3‐dien‐9‐ol represents a class of pheromone compounds novel to both tribes (Callichromatini and Holopleurini), further increasing the chemical space of identified pheromones within the subfamily Cerambycinae. This compound is also noteworthy because it represents an entirely different chemical class of pheromones than the monoepoxide (E)‐2‐cis‐6,7‐epoxynonenal, previously reported as an aggregation‐sex pheromone for the invasive Asian congener Aromia bungii (Faldermann).

Highly Contiguous Genome Assemblies of the Guinea Paper Wasp (Polistes exclamans) and Mischocyttarus mexicanus.

Paper wasps are a model system for the study of social evolution due to a high degree of inter- and intraspecific variation in cooperation, aggression, and visual signals of social status. Increasing the taxonomic coverage of genomic resources for this diverse clade will aid comparative genomic approaches for testing predictions about the molecular basis of social evolution. Here, we provide draft genome assemblies for two well-studied species of paper wasps, Polistes exclamans and Mischocyttarus mexicanus. The P. exclamans genome assembly is 221.5 Mb in length with a scaffold N50 of 4.11 Mb. The M. mexicanus genome assembly is 227 Mb in length with a scaffold N50 of 1.1 Mb. Genomes have low repeat content (9.54–10.75%) and low GC content (32.06–32.4%), typical of other social hymenopteran genomes. The DNA methyltransferase gene, Dnmt3 , was lost early in the evolution of Polistinae. We identified a second independent loss of Dnmt3 within hornets (genus: Vespa).