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Introduction
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Publications (176)
Aim
Climate change has influenced the evolution of the world's biota, shaping species distributions, promoting diversification and causing extinctions. The turbulent climatic oscillations of the Pleistocene, which caused repeated periods of isolation and secondary contact, have left lasting signatures on the genomes of species across the world. The...
Advances in genomics enable the inclusion of historic collection specimens in phylogenetic analyses for the delimitation of natural groups. We capitalise on these developments to generate data from independent sources like mitochondrial genomes, morphology and bionomics. Using leaf-mining moths as model organisms, we address the evolutionary proble...
An examination of type and non-type material deposited in various European scientific collections concludes that the
sexual generation of Andricus truncicolus (Giraud, 1859), recently discovered through laboratory experiments and herein
confirmed by molecular data, is synonymous with Andricus multiplicatus Giraud, 1859; the latter name becomes a ju...
Uncovering the patterns and structure in species interactions is central to understanding community assembly and dynamics. Species interact via their phenotypes, but identifying and
quantifying the traits that structure species-specific interactions (links) can be challenging. Where these traits show phylogenetic signal, link properties (such as wh...
In recent years, new wasp species and genera of Cynipidae have been described, and their species delimitation and evolutionary relationships have been supported using molecular markers. However, few studies have included comprehensive and extensive sampling of specimens across the complete distribution of a single genus. In this study, we analysed...
The two main extensions of rain forest in South America are the Amazon (Amazônia) and the Atlantic rain forest (Mata Atlântica), which are separated by a wide ‘dry diagonal’ of seasonal vegetation. We used the species-rich tree genus Inga to test if Amazônia—Mata Atlântica dispersals have been clustered during specific time periods corresponding to...
The progressive aridification of the Australian continent, and coincident decline of mesic forest, has been a powerful driver of allopatric and environmental speciation in native species. The relictual mesic forests of the eastern seaboard now harbour a diverse group of endemic fauna, including the wood‐feeding cockroaches of the genus Panesthia ,...
1. A key question in insect community ecology is whether parasitoid assemblages are structured by the food plants of their herbivore hosts.
2. Tritrophic communities centred on oak-feeding cynipid gallwasps are one of the best-studied tritrophic insect communities. Previous work suggests that host plant identity is a much stronger predictor of oak...
Revealing processes that structure species interactions is central to understanding community assembly and dynamics. Species interact via their phenotypes, but identifying and quantifying the traits that structure species-specific interactions (links) can be challenging. Where these traits show phylogenetic signal, however, link properties may be p...
The orchid genus Dipodium R.Br. (Epidendroideae) comprises leafy autotrophic and leafless mycoheterotrophic species, with the latter confined to sect. Dipodium. This study examined plastome degeneration in Dipodium in a phylogenomic and temporal context. Whole plastomes were reconstructed and annotated for 24 Dipodium samples representing 14 specie...
The progressive aridification of the Australian continent, and coincident decline of mesic forest, has been a powerful driver of allopatric and environmental speciation in native species. The relictual mesic forests of the eastern seaboard now harbor a diverse group of endemic fauna, including the wood-feeding cockroaches of the genus Panesthia, wh...
The life cycle of Cerroneuroterus minutulus (Giraud, 1859), a species previously known only from its asexual generation, is closed. Our study demonstrates that C. minutulus exhibits the heterogony typical of Cynipini species, with alternating sexual and asexual generations. The identity of the sexual generation is demonstrated by laboratory experim...
The orchid genus Dipodium R.Br. (Epidendroideae) comprises leafy autotrophic and leafless mycoheterotrophic species, the latter confined to sect. Dipodium . This study examined plastome degeneration in Dipodium in a phylogenomic and temporal context. Whole plastomes were reconstructed and annotated for 24 Dipodium samples representing 14 species an...
The Nearctic cynipid oak gall wasp genus Feron Kinsey, comb. rev., is re-established with 34 species: F. albicomus (Weld, 1952), comb. nov., F. amphorus (Weld, 1926), comb. nov., F. apiarium (Weld, 1944), comb. nov., F. atrimentum (Kinsey, 1922), comb. nov., F. bakkeri (Lyon, 1984), comb. nov., F. caepula (Weld, 1926), comb. nov., F. californicum (...
Amphibolips is currently divided into two species-groups, clearly differentiated by adult and gall morphology. The ‘niger’ group of Amphibolips species is revised. This complex includes eight species: A. gumia Kinsey, A. jubatus Kinsey, A. elatus Kinsey, A. maturus Kinsey, A. nebris Kinsey, A. niger Kinsey, A. pistrix Kinsey and A. ufo Cuesta-Porta...
Gall wasps (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae) comprise 13 distinct tribes whose interrelationships remain incompletely understood. Recent analyses of ultra‐conserved elements (UCEs) represent the first attempt at resolving these relationships using phylogenomics. Here, we present the first analysis based on protein‐coding sequences from genome and transcript...
Evolutionary radiations underlie much of the species diversity of life on Earth, particularly within the world’s most species-rich tree flora – that of the Amazon rainforest. Hybridisation catalyses many radiations by generating genetic and phenotypic novelty that promote rapid speciation, but the influence of hybridisation on Amazonian tree radiat...
A new species of skipper butterfly, Toxidia aurantia Braby, sp. nov., is illustrated, diagnosed and described from the northern Kimberley of Western Australia. A molecular phylogeny based on one mitochondrial (COX1 barcode fragment) and four nuclear genes (EF1-a, RSB2, RSB5, Wingless) for nearly all members of Toxidia Mabille, 1891 and its sister g...
A new species, Holocynips illinoiensis Melika & Nicholls, sp. nov. is described from the Nearctic (America north of Mexico). Description, diagnoses, information on biology and host association is given for the new species, as well as preliminary discussion on the coherence of the genus Holocynips.
A new species of skipper butterfly, Toxidia aurantia Braby, sp. nov., is illustrated, diagnosed and described from the northern Kimberley of Western Australia. A molecular phylogeny based on one mito-chondrial (COX1 barcode fragment) and four nuclear genes (EF1-a, RSB2, RSB5, Wingless) for nearly all members of Toxidia Mabille, 1891 and its sister...
Early natural historians-Comte de Buffon, von Humboldt, and De Candolle-established environment and geography as two principal axes determining the distribution of groups of organisms, laying the foundations for biogeography over the subsequent 200 years, yet the relative importance of these two axes remains unresolved. Leveraging phylogenomic and...
Plants are widely recognized as chemical factories, with each species producing dozens to hundreds of unique secondary metabolites. These compounds shape the interactions between plants and their natural enemies. We explore the evolutionary patterns and processes by which plants generate chemical diversity, from evolving novel compounds to unique c...
The Senecio inaequidens – S. madagascariensis complex (Asteraceae:
Senecioneae, subsequently “fireweed complex”) is a group of six
southern African species of Senecio, three of which are considered
invasive in various parts of the world: S. madagascariensis in
South America, Japan, Australia, and the Hawaiian Islands,
S. skirrhodon in New Zealand,...
The hide, larder, and carpet beetles (Coleoptera: Dermestidae) are a family of mainly scavenger beetles, with numerous species such as the khapra beetle (Trogoderma granarium Everts, 1898), the black carpet beetle [Attagenus unicolor (Brahm, 1791)] and the hide beetle (Dermestes maculatus De Geer, 1774) being widely recognized as serious economic p...
Recent years have seen rapid advances in the study of Fagaceae-associated gall wasps (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae) of the Eastern Palaearctic and the Oriental (EPO) regions, for both the gall inducing Cynipini (commonly termed oak gall wasps though many species gall non-oak Fagaceae) and the predominantly inquiline tribes Synergini and Ceroptresini. Thi...
The phylogeny of gall wasps (Cynipidae) and their parasitic relatives has attracted considerable attention in recent years. The family is now widely recognized to fall into thirteen natural lineages, designated tribes, but the relationships among them have remained elusive. This has stymied any progress in understanding how cynipid gall inducers ev...
Most oak gallwasps (Hymenoptera; Cynipidae, Cynipini) have lifecycles involving obligate alternation between a sexual and an asexual generation. Many species are currently known from only one of these generations, with the alternate generation either unknown or separately described with a different name. Here we describe previously unknown generati...
A new species of oak gall wasp, Andricus pseudocecconii Melika, Tavakoli & Stone, sp. nov. (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae, Cynipini) is described. Descriptions, diagnoses, biology, and host associations for the new species are given. The new taxon is supported by morphological and molecular data.
The Nearctic cynipid oak gall wasp genus Druon Kinsey comb. rev. is re-established, with 5 new species and 10 species previously placed in the genus Andricus Hartig 1840: D. alexandri Melika, Nicholls & Stone, sp. nov., D. flocculentum (Lyon), comb. nov., D. fullawayi (Beutenmüller), comb. nov., D. garciamartinonae Pujade-Villar, sp. nov., D. grego...
The hide, larder and carpet beetles (Coleoptera: Dermestidae) are a family of mainly scavenger beetles, with numerous species such as the khapra beetle , the black carpet beetle and the hide beetle, being widely recognised as serious economic pests of stored products and museum collections. In this study we examined and sequenced mitochondrial geno...
In forests, insect herbivores and their host plants are major components of the community. The study of their interactions is essential for understanding the mechanisms promoting and maintaining species diversity and niche differentiation in both trophic levels (Becerra 2015). Theory has long predicted that the evolution of plant anti-herbivore def...
Twenty nine new species of cynipid oak gall wasps from the Nearctic region (America north of Mexico) are described: Andricus archboldi Melika & Abrahamson, sp. nov., A. catalinensis Melika, Nicholls & Stone, sp. nov., A. chapmanii Melika & Abrahamson, sp. nov., A. chiricahuensis Melika, Nicholls & Stone, sp. nov., A. coconinoensis Melika, Nicholls...
A new genus, Prokius Nieves Aldrey, Medianero & Nicholls, gen. nov., and two new species of oak gall wasps (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae: Cynipini), Prokius cambrai Medianero & Nieves-Aldrey sp. nov. and Prokius lisethiae Medianero & Nieves-Aldrey sp. nov., are described from adults reared from galls on Quercus bumelioides Liebm (Fagaceae, sect. Quercus,...
A new genus, Grahamstoneia Melika & Nicholls, gen. nov., with one new species, G. humboldti Melika & Nicholls, sp. nov., asexual generation, is described. This new taxon occurs in the south-western Nearctic, inducing galls on two species within Quercus section Protobalanus (Q. vacciniifolia Kellogg and Q. chrysolepis Liebm.), an ecology and distrib...
We describe three new genera of cynipid oak gall wasps from the Nearctic: Burnettweldia Pujade-Villar, Melika & Nicholls, gen. nov., Nichollsiella Melika, Pujade-Villar & Stone, gen. nov., and Disholandricus Melika, Pujade-Villar & Nicholls, gen. nov. (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae: Cynipini). Burnettweldia includes five species, B. californicordazi Cuest...
Supplementary feeding of wildlife is widespread, being undertaken by more than half of households in many countries. However, the impact that these supplemental resources have is unclear, with impacts largely considered to be restricted to urban ecosystems. We reveal the pervasiveness of supplementary foodstuffs in the diet of a wild bird using met...
The outstanding diversity of Amazonian forests is predicted to be the result of several processes. While tree lineages have dispersed repeatedly across the Amazon, interactions between plants and insects may be the principal mechanism structuring the communities at local scales.
Using metabolomic and phylogenetic approaches, we investigated the pat...
The monophyly and taxonomic validity of some currently accepted genera of gall wasps in the Cynipini (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae) are being challenged by recent systematic studies. Here we used morphological and molecular data to re-describe and revise the taxonomic limits of the monotypic genus Kokkocynips Pujade-Villar & Melika, previously recorded o...
Supplementary feeding of wildlife is widespread, being undertaken by more than half of households in many countries. However, the impact that these additional artificial resources have is unclear, and impacts are assumed to be restricted to urban ecosystems. Using faecal metabarcoding of blue tit (Cyanistes caeruleus) faeces collected in early spri...
A new sexual form of a gallwasp, Andricus forni Pujade-Villar & Nicholls n. sp., is described from China (Zhejiang province) based on males, females and galls collected on Quercus serrata. Data on the morphology, diagnosis, distribution and biology of the new species are provided. Molecular data are also provided to support this species. A key to A...
Premise:
Targeted enrichment methods facilitate sequencing of hundreds of nuclear loci to enhance phylogenetic resolution and elucidate why some parts of the "tree of life" are difficult (if not impossible) to resolve. The mimosoid legumes are a prominent pantropical clade of ~3300 species of woody angiosperms for which previous phylogenies have s...
Bombyliidae is a very species‐rich and widespread family of parasitoid flies with more than 250 genera classified into 17 extant subfamilies. However, little is known about their evolutionary history or how their present‐day diversity was shaped. Transcriptomes of 15 species and anchored hybrid enrichment (AHE) sequence captures of 86 species, repr...
The known species richness of oak gallwasps in Asia has increased tremendously in the past decade. However, the vast majority of taxa have been described from the east coast of Asia, and knowledge of oak gallwasps from Central Asia is still scant. Here we use molecular and morphological characters to describe a new genus of cynipid oak gallwasp, He...
The Neotropics is the most species-rich area in the world and the mechanisms that generated and maintain its biodiversity are still debated. This paper contributes to the debate by investigating the evolutionary and biogeographic history of the genus Ceiba Mill. (Malvaceae: Bombacoideae). Ceiba comprises 18 mostly neotropical species endemic to two...
Little is known about the dietary richness and variation of generalist insectivorous species, including birds, due primarily to difficulties in prey identification. Using faecal metabarcoding we provide the most comprehensive analysis of a passerine's diet to date, identifying the relative magnitudes of biogeographic, habitat and temporal trends in...
The sexual generation of Dryocosmus destefanii Cerasa & Melika, 2018 that emerges from galls on Q. suber L. in Italy is described for the first time, establishing its heterogonic life cycle. We provide observations on its distribution, illustration of adults and galls and information on its biology as supported by morphological and molecular data....
Plant secondary metabolites are a key defence against herbivores, and their evolutionary origin is likely from primary metabolites. Yet for this to occur, an intermediate step of overexpression of primary metabolites would need to confer some advantage to the plant. Here, we examine the evolution of overexpression of the essential amino acid, L‐tyr...
Four species of Dryocosmus cynipid gallwasps are now known to induce galls on Chrysolepis in California and Oregon. Two new species, Dryocosmus demartinii Melika, Nicholls & Stone and Dryocosmus juliae Melika, Nicholls & Stone are described. Males of the sexual generation of D. rileypokei plus adults of the asexual generation of this species are bo...
DNA extraction from blue tit (Cyanistes caeruleus) faeces stored in ethanol. Methodology uses the Qiagen QIAamp DNA Stool Kit (Qiagen part no. 51504), following the “Isolation of DNA from Stool for Pathogen Detection” protocol (June 2012 edition), with some modifications following Zeale et al. 2011 (Mol. Ecol. Res. 11: 236-244) and custom modificat...
We describe a new genus of cynipid oak gallwasp, Protobalandricus Melika, Nicholls & Stone (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae: Cynipini). Protobalandricus gen. nov. includes one previously described species, Disholcaspis spectabilis (Kinsey), which induces stem swelling-like galls on golden cup oaks, Quercus section Protobalanus. Descriptions of the genus and...
Coevolutionary theory has long predicted that the arms race between plants and herbivores is a major driver of host selection and diversification. At a local scale, plant defenses contribute significantly to the structure of herbivore assemblages and the high alpha diversity of plants in tropical rain forests. However, the general importance of pla...
MrBayes majority-rule consensus tree for the nuclear locus wingless, sequenced for exemplars of each of the selected 41 jMOTU 1.5% COI MOTUs. Numbers above nodes indicate posterior probabilities. Taxon labels are colored to indicate membership of different MOTUs.
List of compounds putatively identified through matches to reference MSMS spectra on the Global Natural Products Social Molecular Networking database (https://gnps.ucsd.edu/ProteoSAFe/static/gnps-splash.jsp). The cosine score is a measure of the similarity of MS/MS-derived fragments between two compounds.
Detailed chemical methods for construction of a chemical similarity matrix.
MrBayes majority-rule consensus tree for the mitochondrial COI DNA barcode fragment. Numbers above nodes indicate posterior probabilities. Taxon label colors indicate membership of 1.5% sequence divergence jMOTU taxa, indicated by the labels at right.
MrBayes majority-rule consensus tree for the nuclear locus ITS2, sequenced for exemplars of each of the selected 41 jMOTU 1.5% COI MOTUs. Numbers above nodes indicate posterior probabilities. Taxon labels are colored to indicate membership of different MOTUs.
Phylogenetic relationships for the gene CO1 among the Inga-feeding sawfly MOTUs and a panel of voucher sequences for sawflies in the families Argidae, Pergidae (sister group to Argidae; Malm and Nyman, 2015) and Tenthredinidae. The tree shown is a majority-rule consensus tree constructed in MrBayes, using substitutions modeled as GTR+I+G for each o...
Metadata for additional reference sawfly sequences, with species name, country of origin, Genbank accession numbers for COI and PGD gene fragments, and source reference.
Information on the ten sequence loci used for construction of the Inga species tree. Locus number, reference transcript, functional annotation and the substitution model used in phylogenetic analyses all refer to Nicholls et al. (2015).
Results of MOTU identification analyses of Inga- and Zygia-feeding sawflies, using a 645 bp fragment of the mitochondrial COI DNA barcoding region for (a) jMOTU and (b) ABGD.
Parafit analysis output for sawfly and Inga phylogenies, for sawfly MOTUs in the family Argidae. (B)
Parafit analysis of concordance between sawfly phylogeny and Inga chemogram. In (A) and (B) herbivore-Inga associations that are identified as individually significant are highlighted in yellow.
Sawfly MOTU accumulation curves when sampling over Inga host plant taxa, and when sampling over individuals. For each curve, the mean estimate is shown as a dark blue line and the standard deviation as a pale blue shaded region either side. The total numbers of Inga taxa and sawfly specimens in these analyses were 34 and 1286, respectively.
Metadata for all sawfly specimens collected in this study, including host plant and collection location, MOTU allocation (1.5% jMOTU taxa), and Genbank accession numbers for all sequenced gene fragments. Note that in our sampling system, each study site has independent collection numbers. Thus, it is possible for two Inga plants to have the same ho...
Molecular methods for PCR amplification of sawfly sequences.
Since Dryocosmus kuriphilus (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae) emerged worldwide as a dangerous pest of chestnuts, there is only one dubious record from Japan of a cynipid inquiline reared from its galls. This is the first comprehensively documented record of a cynipid inquiline, Saphonecrus kuriphilusi, new species reared from galls of D. kuriphilus in Gree...
Cynipid gallwasps comprise 1364 species worldwide, predominantly in temperate regions of the Holarctic. The vast majority of recorded species are from the Nearctic and the Western Palaearctic, both of which are long-standing centers of research on the taxonomy and biology of this group. In contrast, the Eastern Palaearctic and the Oriental Region f...
The need for species identification and taxonomic discovery has led to the development of innovative technologies for large‐scale plant identification. DNA barcoding has been useful, but fails to distinguish among many species in species‐rich plant genera, particularly in tropical regions. Here, we show that chemical fingerprinting, or ‘chemocoding...
A new species, Dryocosmus destefanii Cerasa & Melika n. sp. associated with a Cerris section oak, Quercus suber L., is described from Italy. Description, diagnosis, host associations and biology for the new species and an illustrated identification key to the Western Palaearctic Dryocosmus species are given. The description is supported by morpholo...
Communities of insect herbivores and their natural enemies are rich and ecologically crucial components of terrestrial biodiversity. Understanding the processes that promote their origin and maintenance is thus of considerable interest. One major proposed mechanism is ecological speciation through host-associated differentiation (HAD), the divergen...
Approximate Bayesian computation (ABC) is a powerful and widely used approach in inference of population history. However, the computational effort required to discriminate among alternative historical scenarios often limits the set that is compared to those considered more likely a priori. While often justifiable, this approach will fail to consid...
Significance
Although plants and their herbivores account for most of macroscopic, terrestrial biodiversity, we do not fully understand the evolutionary origins of this high diversity. Coevolutionary theory proposes that adaptations between plants and their herbivores are reciprocal and that their interactions might have driven diversification and...
Our knowledge about gall wasps associated with the diverse East Asian oaks, Castanopsis and Cyclobalanopsis, is limited due to the lack of extensive feld studies. Here, we describe twelve new oak gall wasp species, Dryocosmus cannoni Schwéger &Tang, D. caputgrusi Tang &Schwéger, D. crinitus Schwéger &Tang, D. harrisonae Melika &Tang, D. hearni Meli...
Many herbivores employ reward-based mutualisms with ants to gain protection from natural enemies. We examine the evolutionary dynamics of a tetra-trophic interaction in which gall wasp herbivores induce their host oaks to produce nectar-secreting galls, which attract ants that provide protection from parasitoids. We show that, consistent with other...
Herbaria are unparalleled collections of biodiversity information representing the world’s flora. However, this treasure has remained largely inaccessible to genetic studies, frequently limited by the low yields of poor-quality DNA. Next-generation sequencing (NGS) has transformed every field of biological research. The different strategies for acc...
ABSTRACT
Pollen beetles (Nitidulidae, Meligethinae) are among the most abundant flower-visiting insects in Europe. While some species damage millions of hectares of crops annually, the biology of many species is little known. We assessed the utility of a 797 base pair fragment of the cytochrome oxidase 1 gene to resolve Molecular Operational Taxon...
A new species of oak gall wasp, Plagiotrochus tarokoensis Tang and Melika sp. nov., is described from Taiwan. The species induces integral leaf galls on Quercus tarokoensis (Fagaceae). Data on the diagnosis, distribution, and biology of the new species are given. This is the second known Plagiotrochus species from the Oriental region and the first...
Eight new species of cynipid gallwasps, Cycloneuroterus abei Melika & Tang, C. ergei Tang & Melika, C. gilvus Melika & Tang, C. globosus Melika & Tang, C. jianwui Tang & Melika, C. lohsei Melika & Tang, C. tumiclavus Tang & Melika, C. uraianus Tang & Melika, from Taiwan and mainland China are described. Descriptions, diagnoses, biology, and host as...
Fifteen new species of cynipid inquilines, Saphonecrus chinensis Tang & Schweger, S. gilvus Melika & Schweger, S. globosus Schweger & Tang, S. leleyi Melika & Schweger, S. lithocarpii Schweger & Melika, S. longinuxi Schweger & Melika, S. morii Schweger & Tang, S. nantoui Tang, Schweger & Melika, S. nichollsi Schweger & Melika, S. pachylomai-Schwege...
Evolutionary radiations are prominent and pervasive across many plant lineages in diverse geographical and ecological settings; in neotropical rainforests there is growing evidence suggesting that a significant fraction of species richness is the result of recent radiations. Understanding the evolutionary trajectories and mechanisms underlying thes...
Disruption of species interactions is a key issue in climate change biology. Interactions involving forest trees may be particularly vulnerable due to evolutionary rate limitations imposed by long generation times. One mitigation strategy for such impacts is Climate matching – the augmentation of local native tree populations by input from non-loca...
Eight new species of cynipid inquilines, Synergus abei Melika & Schwéger, S. belizinellus Schwéger & Melika, S. changtitangi Melika & Schwéger, S. formosanus Schwéger & Melika, S. ishikarii Melika & Schwéger, S. kawakamii Tang & Melika, S. khazani Melika & Schwéger and S. symbioticus Schwéger & Melika, from the Eastern Palaearctic are described. De...
In the sixth paragraph of the Discussion section entitled “Regional Diversification in Manilkara,” in the sentence beginning “In Sapotaceae four lineages of Isonandreae have migrated… ” the citation of Swenson et al., 2008 should instead be: Swenson, U., Nylinder, S., and Munzinger, J. (2014). Sapotaceae biogeography supports New Caledonia being an...
