Cave invertebrates in Espírito Santo state, Brazil: a primary analysis of endemism, threats and conservation priorities

Convergent Evolution of Wingbeat-Powered Anti-Bat Ultrasound in the Microlepidoptera

Bats and moths provide a textbook example of predator-prey evolutionary arms races, demonstrating adaptations, and counter adaptations on both sides. The evolutionary responses of moths to the biosonar-led hunting strategies of insectivorous bats include convergently evolved hearing structures tuned to detect bat echolocation frequencies. These allow many moths to detect hunting bats and manoeuvre to safety, or in the case of some taxa, respond by emitting sounds which startle bats, jam their biosonar, and/or warn them of distastefulness. Until now, research has focused on the larger macrolepidoptera, but the recent discovery of wingbeat-powered anti-bat sounds in a genus of deaf microlepidoptera (Yponomeuta), suggests that the speciose but understudied microlepidoptera possess further and more widespread anti-bat defences. Here we demonstrate that wingbeat-powered ultrasound production, likely providing an anti-bat function, appears to indeed be spread widely in the microlepidoptera; showing that acoustically active structures (aeroelastic tymbals, ATs) have evolved in at least three, and likely four different regions of the wing. Two of these tymbals are found in multiple microlepidopteran superfamilies, and remarkably, three were found in a single subfamily. We document and characterise sound production from four microlepidopteran taxa previously considered silent. Our findings demonstrate that the microlepidoptera contribute their own unwritten chapters to the textbook bat-moth coevolutionary arms race.

Isopod distribution and climate change

The unique properties of terrestrial isopods regarding responses to limiting factors such as drought and temperature have led to interesting distributional patterns along climatic and other environmental gradients at both species and community level. This paper will focus on the exploration of isopod distributions in evaluating climate change effects on biodiversity at different scales, geographical regions, and environments, in view of isopods’ tolerances to environmental factors, mostly humidity and temperature.

Isopod distribution is tightly connected to available habitats and habitat features at a fine spatial scale, even though different species may exhibit a variety of responses to environmental heterogeneity, reflecting the large interspecific variation within the group.

Furthermore, isopod distributions show some notable deviations from common global patterns, mainly as a result of their ecological features and evolutionary origins. Responses to human disturbance are not always traceable, but a trend towards community homogenisation is often found under strong global urbanisation processes.

In general, even though it is still not clear how predicted climate change will affect isopod distribution, there is evidence that mixed effects are to be expected, depending on the region under study.

We still lack robust and extensive analyses of isopod distributions at different scales and at different biomes, as well as applications of distribution models that might help evaluate future trends.

Cave-dwelling pholcid spiders (Araneae, Pholcidae): a review

Pholcidae are ubiquitous spiders in tropical and subtropical caves around the globe, yet very little is known about cave-dwelling pholcids beyond what is provided in taxonomic descriptions and faunistic papers. This paper provides a review based on a literature survey and unpublished information, while pointing out potential biases and promising future projects. A total of 473 native (i.e. non-introduced) species of Pholcidae have been collected in about 1000 caves. The large majority of cave-dwelling pholcids are not troglomorphic; a list of 86 troglomorphic species is provided, including 21 eyeless species and 21 species with strongly reduced eyes. Most troglomorphic pholcids are representatives of only two genera:AnopsicusChamberlin & Ivie, 1938 andMetagoniaSimon, 1893. Mexico is by far the richest country in terms of troglomorphic pholcids, followed by several islands and mainland SE Asia. The apparent dominance of Mexico may partly be due to collectors’ and taxonomists’ biases. Most caves harbor only one pholcid species, but 91 caves harbor two and more species (up to five species). Most troglomorphic pholcids belong to two subfamilies (Modisiminae, Pholcinae), very few belong to Smeringopinae and Arteminae, none to Ninetinae. This is in agreement with the recent finding that within Pholcidae, microhabitat changes in general are concentrated in Modisiminae and Pholcinae.

Integrative taxonomy reveals a new genus and new species of Philosciidae (Crustacea: Isopoda: Oniscidea) from the Neotropical region

Although new methods and data are conquering space in the field of taxonomy, such as integrative taxonomy, most terrestrial isopod species are still described based only on morphology. Species of the genus Atlantoscia Ferrara and Taiti, 1981 were the first and are the unique terrestrial isopods from the Neotropics for which a molecular phylogeny was already conducted. Previous results indicated that this genus could be paraphyletic, and a more detailed analysis would be required. Our aim was to reconstruct the phylogeny of Atlantoscia using mitochondrial and nuclear markers and test its monophyly by integrating molecular and morphological data. We observed that, indeed, Atlantoscia is paraphyletic. Atlantoscia ituberasensis Campos-Filho, Lisboa and Araujo, 2013 and Atlantoscia rubromarginata Araujo and Leistikow, 1999 were placed in a new genus of terrestrial isopods, Paratlantoscia gen. nov., together with a new species described in the present study, Paratlantoscia robusta sp. nov. The new genus is defined by the presence of specialized respiratory areas in the pleopod exopods and its validity is highly corroborated by molecular analyses and by biogeographic information. This study highlights the importance of multiple and complementary perspectives as a way to improve the quality of species hypothesis and associated descriptions.

New species and new records of terrestrial isopods (Crustacea, Isopoda, Oniscidea) from Brazil

ABSTRACT. A large collection of terrestrial isopods from different Brazilian regions was examined. Two new species of Amazoniscus Lemos de Castro, 1967 (Scleropactidae) are described: A. zimmeri Campos-Filho, Montesanto & Araujo sp. nov. from the state of Pará and A. schmidti Campos-Filho, Montesanto & Taiti sp. nov. from the state of Minas Gerais. Pseudotyphloscia alba (Dollfus, 1898) (Philosciidae) is firstly recorded from Brazil. The systematic position of Venezillo tuberosus (Budde-Lund, 1904) is discussed and transferred to Ctenorillo Verhoeff, 1942. Androdeloscia lejeunei (Lemos de Castro & Souza, 1986) and Diploexochus echinatus Brandt, 1833 from the state of Pará, are redescribed.