Florida Museum of Natural History

Communities that occupy similar environments but vary in the richness of closely related species can illuminate how functional variation and species richness interact to fill ecological space in the absence of abiotic filtering, though this has yet to be explored on an oceanic island where the processes of community assembly may differ from continental settings. In discrete montane communities on the island of Sulawesi, local murine rodent (rats and mice) richness ranges from 7 to 23 species. We measured 17 morphological, ecological, and isotopic traits – both individually and as five multivariate traits – in 40 species to test for the expansion or packing of functional space among nine murine communities. We employed a novel probabilistic approach for integrating intraspecific and community‐level trait variance into functional richness. Trait‐specific and phylogenetic diversity patterns indicate dynamic community assembly due to variable niche expansion and packing on multiple niche axes. Locomotion and covarying traits such as tail length emerged as a fundamental axis of ecological variation, expanding functional space and enabling the niche packing of other traits such as diet and body size. Though trait divergence often explains functional diversity in island communities, we found that phylogenetic diversity facilitates functional space expansion in some conserved traits such as cranial shape, while more labile traits are overdispersed both within and between island clades, suggesting a role of niche complementarity. Our results evoke interspecific interactions, differences in trait lability, and the independent evolutionary trajectories of each of Sulawesi's six murine clades as central to generating the exceptional functional diversity and species richness in this exceptional, insular radiation.

Urbanization in temperate climates often advances the beginning and peak of biological events due to multiple factors, especially urban heat islands. However, the effect of urbanization on insect phenology remains understudied in more tropical areas, where temperature may be a weaker phenological cue. We surveyed moths across an urban gradient in a subtropical city weekly for a year to test how impervious surface and canopy cover impact phenology at the caterpillar and adult life stages. For macro‐moths, we also examine how these effects vary with life history traits. When pooling all individuals, we found no effect of urbanization proxy variables on timing of caterpillar or adult phenology. At the species‐specific level, we found timing of peak adult macro‐moths is influenced by canopy cover, which also interacts with two traits: temperature niche and body size. Cold‐adapted species delay timing of peak abundance in more shaded sites, while warm‐adapted species were not affected. Smaller species, associated with lower dispersal ability, were more phenologically sensitive to canopy cover than larger bodied species. These results highlight the importance of canopy cover within cities and its interaction with species' traits in mediating impact of urbanization on moth phenology in subtropical systems.

Sex chromosomes have evolved hundreds of times across the flowering plant tree of life; their recent origins in some members of this clade can shed light on the early consequences of suppressed recombination, a crucial step in sex chromosome evolution. Amborella trichopoda, the sole species of a lineage that is sister to all other extant flowering plants, is dioecious with a young ZW sex determination system. Here we present a haplotype-resolved genome assembly, including highly contiguous assemblies of the Z and W chromosomes. We identify a ~3-megabase sex-determination region (SDR) captured in two strata that includes a ~300-kilobase inversion that is enriched with repetitive sequences and contains a homologue of the Arabidopsis METHYLTHIOADENOSINE NUCLEOSIDASE (MTN1-2) genes, which are known to be involved in fertility. However, the remainder of the SDR does not show patterns typically found in non-recombining SDRs, such as repeat accumulation and gene loss. These findings are consistent with the hypothesis that dioecy is derived in Amborella and the sex chromosome pair has not significantly degenerated.

Recent collections in the seasonally dry tropical forests of Hispaniola have uncovered a new species of the American clade Castela, described here as Castela plenaensis, endemic to the eastern side of the western extension of the Sierra de Bahoruco in the Dominican Republic just south of the geological formation, Hoyo del Pelempito. Castela plenaensis forms part of the diverse, Greater Antillean Caribbean clade, the most species-rich group among all Castela, and is sister to another recently described Hispaniolan endemic, C. senticosa. We provide a description and illustration of the new species and place it phylogenetically, using morphologic and molecular data. We also provide an identification key to the three species of Castela on Hispaniola and a distribution map of these species. Also, we lectotypify Castela depressa, the type species of the genus, as well as C. erecta. The description of yet another species of Castela from Hispaniola further highlights the importance of the understudied, but yet biodiverse, seasonally dry tropical forests of the Greater Antilles.

Comparisons of extant and extinct biodiversity are often dependent on objective morphology-based identifications of fossils and assume a well-established and comparable taxonomy for both fossil and modern taxa. However, since many modern (cryptic) species are delimitated mainly via external morphology and / or molecular data, it is often unclear to what degree fossilized (osteological) remains allow classification to a similar level. When intraspecific morphological variation in extant taxa is poorly known, the definition of extinct species as well as the referral of fossils to extant species can be heavily biased, particularly if fossils are represented by incomplete isolated skeletal elements. This problem is especially pronounced in squamates (lizards and snakes) owing to a lack of osteological comparative knowledge for many lower taxonomic groups, concomitant with a recent increase of molecular studies revealing great cryptic diversity. Here, we apply a quantitative approach using 3D geometric morphometrics on 238 individuals of 14 genera of extant Australian and Papua New Guinean agamid lizards to test the value of two isolated skull bones (frontals and maxillae) for inferring taxonomic and ecological affinities. We further test for the consistency of intra- and interspecific morphological variability of these elements as a proxy for extinct taxonomic richness. We show that both bones are diagnostic at the generic level, and both can infer microhabitat and are of palaeoecological utility. However, species-level diversity is likely underestimated by both elements, with ~30-40% of species pairs showing no significant differences in shape. Mean intraspecific morphological variability is largely consistent across species and bones and thus a useful proxy for extinct species diversity. Reducing sample size and landmark completeness to approximate fossil specimens led to decreased classification accuracy and increased variance of morphological disparity, raising further doubts on the transferability of modern species borders to the fossil record of agamids. Our results highlight the need to establish appropriate levels of morphology-based taxonomic or ecological groupings prior to comparing extant and extinct biodiversity.

The increasing online availability of biodiversity data and advances in ecological modeling have led to a proliferation of open‐source modeling tools. In particular, R packages for species distribution modeling continue to multiply without guidance on how they can be employed together, resulting in high fidelity of researchers to one or several packages. Here, we assess the wide variety of software for species distribution models (SDMs) and highlight how packages can work together to diversify and expand analyses in each step of a modeling workflow. We also introduce the new R package ‘sdmverse' to catalog metadata for packages, cluster them based on their methodological functions, and visualize their relationships. To demonstrate how pluralism of software use helps improve SDM workflows, we provide three extensive and fully documented analyses that utilize tools for modeling and visualization from multiple packages, then score these tutorials according to recent methodological standards. We end by identifying gaps in the capabilities of current tools and highlighting outstanding challenges in the development of software for SDMs.

Course‐based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) can be a powerful tool in broadening participation in undergraduate research. In this paper, we review the benefits of and barriers to undergraduate research experiences and explore how CUREs can mitigate some of those issues. As a part of the NSF‐supported Biological Collections in Ecology and Evolution Network (BCEENET) activities, a series of network meetings produced a set of recommendations to increase the accessibility of CUREs for all students at all institution types. We use BCEENET CUREs that focus on digitized natural history collections data to illustrate how leveraging adaptable open educational resources that use freely available data and analysis tools can increase accessibility of undergraduate research. We also discuss how inclusive networks of educators and research collaborators can support broadening CURE implementation.

The New World warblers (Parulidae) are a model group for ecological and evolutionary analyses. However, current phylogenetic relationships across this family are based upon few loci. Here we use ultraconserved elements (UCEs) to estimate a rigorous species-level phylogeny for the family. As is true for many groups, high-quality tissues were unavailable for some taxa. Thus, we explored methods for incorporating sequences derived from historical (toe pad) samples to expand the phylogenetic datasets. We recovered an average of 4,186 UCE loci and mitochondrial bycatch data (supplemented with published mitochondrial data) from 96% of all currently recognized species. We found that the UCE phylogeny built with alignments with less than 70% of gaps and ambiguities recovered the most robust phylogenetic relationships for this family, representing 101 species. Using this phylogeny as a topological backbone and adding ten fair quality “bad” samples effectively generated an overall well supported phylogeny, representing 108 species (~90% of all species). Based on this tree, we then added in seven poor quality “ugly” samples and six of those were placed within their expected genera. We also explored the phylogenetic positions of the likely extinct Leucopeza semperi and the endangered Catharopeza bishopi where limited data was obtained. Overall, taxonomic placements in our UCE trees largely correspond to previously published studies with the recovery of all currently recognized genera as monophyletic except for Basileuterus which was rendered paraphyletic by B. lachrymosus. Our study provides insights in understanding the phylogenetic relationships of a model Passeriformes family and outlines effective practices for managing sparse genomic data sourced from historical museum specimens. Variable topological arrangements across datasets and analyses reflect the evolutionary complexity of this group and provide future topics for in-depth studies.

Climatic change is dramatically altering phenology but generalities regarding tempo and mode of response remain limited. Here we present a general model framework incorporating spring temperature, velocity of spring warming, and species’ thermal requirements for predicting phenological response to warming. A key prediction of this framework is that species active earlier in the season and located in warmer regions where spring temperature velocity is lowest show strongest sensitivity to climatic change and greatest advancement in response to warming. We test this prediction using plant phenology datasets collected in the 1850s and 2010s. Our results strikingly confirm model predictions, showing that while temperature sensitivity is higher in regions with low temperature velocity, the greatest realized change in phenological onset is northern areas where warming rates have been fastest. Our framework offers enhanced utility for predicting phenological sensitivity and responsiveness in temperate regions and across multiple plant species and potentially other groups.

Cistaceae are shrubs, subshrubs and herbs that often occur in stressful, fire-prone or disturbed environments and form ectomycorrhizal (ECM) associations with symbiotic fungi. Although some Cistaceae are long-lived shrubs that grow to significant size, others are herbaceous annuals or short-lived plants. Thus, Cistaceae are atypical ECM hosts that are fundamentally different in their biology from trees that are the more typically studied ECM hosts. The Mediterranean region is the center of diversity for Cistaceae and the ectomycorrhizal fungi associated with Cistaceae hosts have primarily been studied in Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East. Mediterranean Cistaceae often host diverse communities of ECM fungi, but they also act as hosts for some ECM fungi that putatively show host-specificity or strong host preference for Cistaceae (including species of Delastria, Hebeloma, Terfezia, and Tirmania). The ECM associations of Cistaceae in North America, however, remain highly understudied. Here we use fungal DNA metabarcoding to document the ectomycorrhizal fungal communities associated with Crocanthemum and Lechea (Cistaceae) in open, fire-prone sandhill habitats in north Florida. At each site we also sampled nearby Pinus to determine whether small, herbaceous Cistaceae have specialized ECM fungi or whether they share their ECM fungal community with nearby pines. The ECM communities of Florida Cistaceae are dominated by Cenococcum (Ascomycota) and Russula (Basidiomycota) species but were also significantly associated with Delastria, an understudied genus of mostly truffle-like Pezizales (Ascomycota). Although many Cistaceae ECM fungi were shared with neighboring pines, the ECM communities with Cistaceae were nonetheless significantly different than those of pines.

Based on recent collecting and a synthesis of ~100 years of historical data, 219 caddisfly species are reported from the state of Indiana. Seventeen species are reported herein from the state for the first time, including two previously thought to be endemic to the southeastern USA. Species records are also presented herein organized by drainage basin, ecoregion, glacial history, and waterbody type for two distinct time periods: before 1983 and after 2005. More species were reported from the state before 1983 than after 2005, despite collecting almost 3× the number of occurrence records during the latter period. Species occurrence records were greater for most families and functional feeding groups (FFGs) for the post-2005 time period, although the Limnephilidae, Phryganeidae, Molannidae, and Lepidostomatidae, particularly those in the shredder FFG, instead had greater records before 1983. This loss of shredders probably reflected the ongoing habitat degradation within the state. While species rarefaction predicts only a few more species to be found in Indiana, many regions still remain under-sampled and 44 species have not been collected in >40 years.

The genus Brachycephalus includes miniaturized toadlets with two distinct morphotypes: brightly colored species with a bufoniform phenotype and smaller, cryptic species with a leptodactyliform phenotype. The diversity of leptodactyliform species is still underappreciated, and we generally lack fundamental information about their biology. Recent sampling efforts, including DNA analyses and recordings of advertisement calls, have improved our understanding of this group. In the present study, we describe a new species of Brachycephalus, one of the smallest vertebrates known. This new species is distinguished from its congeners by a combination of morphological, bioacoustic, and genetic data. Despite being among the smallest frogs globally (the second smallest amphibian species), it exhibits skeletal traits typical of larger frogs, such as the presence of cranial bones that are lost or fused in other miniature frogs, including other Brachycephalus. Our description underscores how new discoveries within the megadiverse fauna of the Atlantic Forest—a rich biodiversity hotspot—can provide insights into phenotypic variation, including vertebrate body size. By describing this new species, we also aim to revisit the hypothesis that the type series of B. hermogenesi includes two species, potentially including individuals of the species described here.

How landscape composition and configuration impact the distribution of multi-vector and multi-host mosquito vector-borne disease systems, such as West Nile virus (WNV), remains challenging because of complex habitat and resource requirements by hosts and vectors that affect transmission opportunities. We examined correlations between landscape composition and configuration and 2018 WNV sentinel chicken seroconversion in Florida, USA across the state and within five National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) bioclimatic regions to understand strength and variation of landscape effects during an elevated transmission year. Although few landscape studies have examined WNV in Florida, we expected higher percentages of residential or medium-developed landscapes and more fragmented landscapes would be positively correlated with WNV seroconversion owing to the main mosquito vector habitats and avian host distributions. However, we expected to find variation in the importance of forest, wetland, and agriculture landscapes across bioclimatic regions in the state. WNV seroconversion rates were calculated using Florida 2018 Department of Health WNV sentinel chicken seroconversion data from 187 flocks maintained by mosquito control programs. Percent land cover and edge density metrics were calculated for multiple land cover classes and within multiple buffer distances from chicken coops using 2019 National Land Cover Data. We used binomial generalized linear mixed effects models to calculate the importance of landscape metrics to WNV seroconversion. We found no statewide predictors of seroconversion, but as expected, the importance of landscape varied across regions. In the north-central part of the state, we found higher seroconversion in less populated suburban areas while higher seroconversion in south-central Florida was correlated with fragmented forested areas within 0.5 km of coops and intact woody wetland areas within 2 km of coops. This work corroborates previous findings that consistent landscape predictors of WNV are difficult to identify across broader geographic areas and sets the stage for additional work that incorporates climate and landscapes interactions for a greater understanding of WNV ecology in this geographic region.

While flowering plants have diversified in virtually every terrestrial clime, climate constrains the distribution of individual lineages. Overcoming climatic constraints may be associated with diverse evolutionary phenomena including whole genome duplication (WGD), gene‐tree conflict, and life‐history changes. Climatic shifts may also have facilitated increases in flowering plant diversification rates. We investigate climatic shifts in the flowering plant order Ericales, which consists of c. 14 000 species with diverse climatic tolerances. We estimate phylogenetic trees from transcriptomic data, 64 chloroplast loci, and Angiosperms353 nuclear loci that, respectively, incorporate 147, 4508, and 2870 Ericales species. We use these phylogenetic trees to analyse how climatic shifts are associated with WGD, gene‐tree conflict, life‐history, and diversification rates. Early branches in the phylogenetic trees are extremely short, and have high levels of gene‐tree conflict and at least one WGD. On lineages descended from these early branches, there is a significant association between climatic shifts (primarily out of tropical climates), further WGDs, and life‐history. Extremely short early branches, and their associated gene‐tree conflict and WGDs, appear to underpin the explosive origin of numerous species rich Ericales clades. The evolution of diverse climatic tolerances in these species rich clades is tightly associated with WGD and life‐history.

Insect coloration has evolved in response to multiple pressures, and in Odonata (dragonflies and damselflies) a body of work supports a role of wing color in a variety of visual signals and potentially in thermoregulation. Previous efforts have focused primarily on melanistic coloration even though wings are often multicolored, and there has yet to be comprehensive comparative analyses of wing color across broad geographic regions and phylogenetic groups. Percher vs. flier flight-style, a trait with thermoregulatory and signaling consequences, has not yet been studied with regard to color. We used a new color clustering approach to quantify color across a dataset of over 8,000 odonate wing images representing 343 Nearctic species. We then utilized phylogenetically informed Bayesian zero-inflated mixture models to test how color varies with mean ambient temperature, body size, sex and flight-style. We found that wing coloration clustered into two groups across all specimens - light brown-yellow and black-dark brown - with black-dark brown being a much more cohesive grouping. Male perchers have a greater proportion of black-dark brown color on their wings as do species with longer wings. In colder climates, odonates were more likely to have black-dark brown color present, but we found no relationship between the proportion of black and temperature. Light brown-yellow showed similar scaling with wing length, but no relationship with temperature. Our results suggest that black-dark brown coloration may have a limited role in thermoregulation, while light brown-yellow does not have such a role. We also find that the odonate sexes are divergent in wing color in percher species only, suggesting a strong role for color in signaling in more territorial males. Our research contributes to an understanding of complex interactions driving ecological and evolutionary dynamics of color in animals.

The magnificent catshark Proscyllium magnificum was described in 2004 based off five specimens collected in the Andaman Sea off Myanmar. It was originally allocated to the genus Proscyllium, but recent molecular analyses suggested it was more closely related to the harlequin catshark Ctenacis fehlmanni from the western Indian Ocean. This study incorporated meristics and external and internal morphology, together with molecular data to reclassify the magnificent catshark as Ctenacis magnificum and provides revised diagnoses for the genera Ctenacis and Proscyllium. Ctenacis consists of two allopatric Indian Ocean species, while Proscyllium is monotypic genus confined to the northwest Pacific. The revised Ctenacis can be distinguished from Proscyllium in having a broader and longer head (head length 21%–23% vs. 16%–18% of total length), distance between pectoral and pelvic bases shorter than head length (vs. greater than head length), more teeth (upper jaw with 80–86 vs. 46–62 tooth files), and a complex colour pattern of dark reddish‐brown blotches and saddles (vs. colour pattern of small black spots). A revised key to the genera of proscylliids and species of Ctenacis is provided.

Biological nitrogen fixation is a fundamental part of ecosystem functioning. Anthropogenic nitrogen deposition and climate change may, however, limit the competitive advantage of nitrogen-fixing plants, leading to reduced relative diversity of nitrogen-fixing plants. Yet, assessments of changes of nitrogen-fixing plant long-term community diversity are rare. Here, we examine temporal trends in the diversity of nitrogen-fixing plants and their relationships with anthropogenic nitrogen deposition while accounting for changes in temperature and aridity. We used forest-floor vegetation resurveys of temperate forests in Europe and the United States spanning multiple decades. Nitrogen-fixer richness declined as nitrogen deposition increased over time but did not respond to changes in climate. Phylogenetic diversity also declined, as distinct lineages of N-fixers were lost between surveys, but the “winners” and “losers” among nitrogen-fixing lineages varied among study sites, suggesting that losses are context dependent. Anthropogenic nitrogen deposition reduces nitrogen-fixing plant diversity in ways that may strongly affect natural nitrogen fixation.

Literature reports of hyperostosis are often misleading and have been confused with osteomas, a pathological condition. Hyperostotic bones are known to occur only in bony fishes of the class Actinopterygii, within at least 16 orders, 35 families, 89 genera, and 153 species. They are present almost exclusively in marine fishes and exceptionally in a few extinct freshwater species known from hypersaline environments and one extant cichlid. Hyperostosis is best represented in the family Carangidae where it is known to occur in 53 of approximately 181 valid species. We also provide a synthetic report on what we know and what misconceptions exist regarding hyperostosis. Patterns of hyperostosis are often species‐specific but provide no useful phylogenetic information. In species known to develop hyperostosis, it is usually not apparent (non‐histologically) in juveniles and typically only becomes fully developed in the largest individuals. The timing of hyperostosis on‐set in different bones is often sequential rather than simultaneous across different bones. Most marine Neoteleostei have acellular skeletons but histological observations have shown that in species exhibiting hyperostosis, areas of active remodeling are composed primarily of cellular bone characterized by a rich vascular network and bone‐resorbing osteoclasts.

Ghost moths are an unusual family of primitive moths (Lepidoptera: Hepialidae) known for their large body size and crepuscular adult activity. These moths represent an ancient lineage, frequently have soil dwelling larvae, and are adapted to high elevations, deserts, and other extreme environments. Despite being rather speciose with more than 700 species, there is a dearth of genomic resources for the family. Here, we present the first high quality, publicly available hepialid genome, generated from an Andean species of ghost moth, Druceiella hillmani. Our genome assembly has a length of 2,586 Mbp with contig N50 of 28.1 Mb and N50 of 29, and BUSCO completeness of 97.1%, making it one of the largest genomes in the order Lepidoptera. Our assembly is a vital resource for future research on ghost moth genomics.