Insights into the evolutionary history of Indo-Pacific bloodfeeding terrestrial leeches (Hirudinida:Arhynchobdellida:Haemadipisdae)

2010 ◽  
Vol 24 (5) ◽  
pp. 456 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Borda ◽  
Mark E. Siddall

Haemadipsidae is a clade of notorious bloodfeeding annelids adapted to tropical and sub-tropical rainforests found throughout the Indo-Pacific. This family traditionally includes duognathous (two-jawed) endemics, each placed in their own genus, from continental and volcanic islands including: Australia, Indonesia, Madagascar, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Seychelles, and South Pacific islands, while trignathous (three-jawed) Tritetrabdella species and the speciose Haemadipsa are exclusive to the Indian subcontinent ranging into east and south-east Asia. One of the more compelling aspects of haemadipsids is their distribution on post-Gondwanan landmasses. In this study, the phylogenetic relationships, taxonomy and biogeographic patterns of Haemadipsidae were examined. Over 5 kb of sequence data from three genes (nuclear 18S rDNA and 28S rDNA and mitochondrial COI) for 37 haemadipsid exemplars, representing 12 of the 15 recognised genera, were analysed under the criteria of maximum parsimony and Bayesian inference. The results show that widespread duognathous species form a monophyletic group derived from trignathous ancestry and are sister to a new trignathous clade for Haemadipsidae. This phylogenetic hypothesis rejected Gondwanan vicariance as an explanation for the diversification of haemadipsids. Haemadipsidae is accepted as the formal name for these Indo-Pacific leeches. Whereas the subdivisions Haemadipsinae and Domanibdellinae are clarified, there is a need to establish a new subfamily, Tritetrabdellinae, for the newly identified trignathous clade that is sister to Domanibdellinae. This study provides a basis for continued elucidation of the evolutionary relationships and classification of these terrestrial annelids.

2006 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 560-570 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mike Thiv ◽  
Mats Thulin ◽  
Norbert Kilian ◽  
H. Peter Linder

We investigated the colonization of the Indian Ocean archipelago of Socotra through phylogenetic analysis of Aerva (Amaranthaceae) based on nuclear and plastid DNA sequence data. The biogeographic history of the genus was tracked using ancestral area reconstructions and molecular dating. Three independent colonization lineages from the Eritreo-Arabian subregion of the Sudano-Zambesian Region were revealed: one endemic clade comprising Aerva revoluta / A. microphylla and once within A. lanata and A. javanica. Our results provide further support for the dominance of Eritreo-Arabian affinities in the flora of Socotra, in contrast to more rare affinities to Madagascar, the Mascarenes, southern Africa, and tropical Asia. Our data point towards colonization via dispersal, rather than a vicariance origin of the island elements. The overall biogeographic patterns of Aerva show only limited concordance with other taxonomic groups distributed on Indian Ocean islands.


2012 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna E. Syme ◽  
Daniel J. Murphy ◽  
Gareth D. Holmes ◽  
Stuart Gardner ◽  
Rachael Fowler ◽  
...  

Although the Australasian grass genus Austrostipa is species rich, abundant and ecologically significant, the subgeneric classification of its 62 species has not been comprehensively tested with molecular data. We used three molecular markers from 51 species to determine a phylogeny of the genus and found strong support for the following seven of the existing subgenera: Falcatae, Austrostipa, Aulax, Lobatae, Bambusina, Lancea and Longiaristatae. The molecular data do not support Tuberculatae and Eremophilae, which could be combined with subgenus Austrostipa. The data are equivocal or insufficient regarding monophyly of Ceres, Arbuscula, Petaurista and Lanterna. Data from the nuclear internal transcribed spacer region appear to be suitable for phylogenetic analysis of this group, and the degree of sequence variability resolves species-level relationships with good levels of support. In contrast, chloroplast sequence data from the matK and rbcL genes do not resolve most relationships at the species level, and the inferred phylogeny hints at gene duplication, chloroplast capture, or deep coalescence in the evolutionary history of Austrostipa.


ZooKeys ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 824 ◽  
pp. 109-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham Short ◽  
David Harasti ◽  
Healy Hamilton

The taxonomic status of the seahorse Hippocampusprocerus Kuiter, 2001, type locality Hervey Bay, QLD, Australia, was re-examined based on its strong morphological similarity and geographical proximity to its congener H.whitei Bleeker, 1855, a species recorded in ten estuaries of New South Wales, Australia. Kuiter (2001) distinguished H.procerus from H.whitei by a taller coronet, marginally lower meristics, and spinier physiognomy. Meristic, morphometric, and key diagnostic morphological character comparisons from vouchered specimens of the two purported species collected from Sydney Harbour, Nelson Bay, Port Stephens, NSW and Hervey Bay, Bundaberg, and Moreton Bay, QLD did not show diagnostic differences to support species-level classification of H.procerus. Furthermore, partial mitochondrial COI sequence data from specimens sampled from known geographical distributions in NSW and Southport, QLD failed to discriminate between populations as a result of shared haplotypes, and revealed an average intraspecific divergence of 0.002%. Hippocampusprocerus is hereby placed in the synonymy of H.whitei; a redescription is provided, with a revised record of its range across eastern Australia.


2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (Supplement_1) ◽  
Author(s):  
K Bachanek-Bankowska ◽  
A Di Nardo ◽  
J Wadsworth ◽  
D King ◽  
N Knowles

Abstract Foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) is a highly contagious disease of livestock affecting animal production and trade throughout Asia and Africa. Understanding FMD virus (FMDV) global movements and evolution can help to reconstruct the disease spread between endemic regions and predict the risks of incursion into FMD-free countries. Global expansion of a single FMDV lineage is rare but can result in severe economic consequences. Using extensive sequence data, we have reconstructed the global space-time transmission history of the O/ME-SA/Ind-2001 lineage (which normally circulates in the Indian sub-continent) providing evidence of at least fifteen independent escapes during 2013–7 that have led to outbreaks in North Africa, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and the Far East and the FMD-free islands of Mauritius. We demonstrated that sequence heterogeneity of this emerging FMDV lineage is accommodated within two co-evolving divergent sublineages, and that recombination by exchange of capsid-coding sequences can impact upon the reconstructed evolutionary histories. Thus, we recommend that only sequences encoding the outer capsid proteins should be used for broad-scale phylogeographical reconstruction. These data emphasize the importance of the Indian subcontinent as a source of FMDV that can spread across large distances and illustrates the impact of FMDV genome recombination on FMDV molecular epidemiology.


2004 ◽  
Vol 359 (1450) ◽  
pp. 1455-1464 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Toby Pennington ◽  
Quentin C. B. Cronk ◽  
James A. Richardson

Phylogenetic trees based upon DNA sequence data, when calibrated with a dimension of time, allow inference of: (i) the pattern of accumulation of lineages through time; (ii) the time of origin of monophyletic groups; (iii) when lineages arrived in different geographical areas; (iv) the time of origin of biome–specific morphologies. This gives a powerful new view of the history of biomes that in many cases is not provided by the incomplete plant fossil record. Dated plant phylogenies for angiosperm families such as Leguminoaceae (Fabaceae), Melastomataceae sensu stricto , Annonaceae and Rhamnaceae indicate that long–distance, transoceanic dispersal has played an important role in shaping their distributions, and that this can obscure any effect of tectonic history, previously assumed to have been the major cause of their biogeographic patterns. Dispersal from other continents has also been i mportant in the assembly of the Amazonian rainforest flora and the Australian flora. Comparison of dated biogeographic patterns of plants and animals suggests that recent long–distance dispersal might be more prevalent in plants, which has major implications for community assembly and coevolution. Dated plant phylogenies also reveal the role of past environmental changes on the evolution of lineages in species–rich biomes, and show that recent Plio–Pleistocene diversification has contributed substantially to their current species richness. Because of the critical role of fossils and morphological characters in assigning ages to nodes in phylogenetic trees, future studies must include careful morphological consideration of fossils and their extant relatives in a phylogenetic context. Ideal study systems will be based upon DNA sequence data from multiple loci and multiple fossil calibrations. This allows cross–validation both of age estimates from different loci, and from different fossil calibrations. For a more complete view of biome history, future studies should emphasize full taxon sampling in ecologically important groups, and should focus on geographical areas for which few species–level phylogenies are available, such as tropical Africa and Asia. These studies are urgent because understanding the history of biomes can both inform conservation decisions, and help predict the effects of future environmental changes at a time when biodiversity is being impacted on an unprecedented scale.


2006 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 64
Author(s):  
Emma L. Burns ◽  
Brian H. Costello ◽  
Bronwyn A. Houlden

We examined phylogenetic relationships within the genus Brachylophus, which comprises two endangered iguana species endemic to the South Pacific islands of Fiji and Tonga. Genetic variation among Fijian Crested Iguanas B. vitiensis and Fijian and Tongan Banded Iguanas B. fasciatus was analysed using mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) cytochrome b (cyt b) characterized from 35 individuals from island populations. Three distinct clades of Brachylophus were identified. The most divergent clade comprised B. fasciatus from Tonga, which supports the recognition of Tongan iguanas as a separate species. Molecular clock estimates suggested that the average sequence divergence (6.4%) between Tongan and Fijian B. fasciatus clades equated to 7 - 15.8 MY of separation, confirming that extant Brachylophus species have a long history of evolution in situ in the Fijian and Tongan archipelago. Phylogenetic analyses also revealed that Fijian B. fasciatus and B. vitiensis iguana populations were not reciprocally monophyletic. One clade comprised two mtDNA haplotypes from the Fijian islands of Monu, Monuriki, Devuilau, Waya and Yadua Taba. The other clade comprised B. fasciatus haplotypes from Kadavu and Gau, which was divergent from both the aforementioned Fijian clade (dA = 3.5%), and the Tongan clade (dA = 6.4%). In addition to mtDNA data, variation was assessed at microsatellite loci, and significant differentiation between iguana populations was detected. Based on both mtDNA and microsatellite analysis, the conservation priorities for these endangered lizards must be reassessed to protect iguanas as three distinct evolutionarily significant units.


Author(s):  
Mario Cupello ◽  
Fernando Z. Vaz-de-Mello

Although extensively studied by different authors over the past 150 years, the taxonomy of Canthon Hoffmannsegg, 1817 and allied genera (which are here informally referred to as ‘Canthon sensu lato’) still remains problematic. With the aim of resolving some of the questions surrounding these taxa, the present work reviews the taxonomy of one of them, the genus Sylvicanthon Halffter & Martínez, 1977. As defined here, Sylvicanthon is distributed mainly throughout the vast areas of tropical rainforests in the Neotropical region and includes 15 species divided into two groups: the enkerlini group, with a single species, S. enkerlini (Martínez et al., 1964) comb. nov., and the candezei group, with five subgroups: the candezei subgroup, with S. candezei (Harold, 1869), S. genieri sp. nov. and S. foveiventris (Schmidt, 1920); the aequinoctialis subgroup, with S. aequinoctialis (Harold, 1868) comb. nov. and S. proseni (Martínez, 1949) stat. et comb. nov.; the bridarollii subgroup, with S. bridarollii (Martínez, 1949), S. seag sp. nov., S. edmondsi sp. nov. and S. attenboroughi sp. nov.; the furvus subgroup, with S. furvus (Schmidt, 1920), S. monnei sp. nov., S. mayri sp. nov. and S. obscurus (Schmidt, 1920); and the securus subgroup, with a single species, S. securus (Schmidt, 1920) comb. nov. Three species originally included in Sylvicanthon are here (re)transferred to Canthon: Canthon xanthopus Blanchard, 1846 and C. machadoi (Martínez & Pereira, 1967) comb. nov., as well as C. cobosi (Pereira & Martínez, 1960) stat. et comb. nov., which had been previously in synonymy under C. xanthopus. Descriptions, redescriptions, illustrations and comparative tables on the external morphology (including the genital capsule) of the genus and its species are presented, as well as a detailed discussion on their biogeography, comparative morphology, hypotheses on their phylogenetic relationships, data on natural history and a detailed historical revision of the classification of ‘Canthon sensu lato’. Finally, we also discuss the so-called ‘species problem’ (i.e., the definition of the scientific term ‘species’) and its consequences to dung beetle taxonomy and favour the solution offered by the Biological Species Concept.


2021 ◽  
Vol 154 (3) ◽  
pp. 458-469
Author(s):  
Rodrigo Lopes Borges ◽  
Sylvain G. Razafimandimbison ◽  
Nádia Roque ◽  
Catarina Rydin

Background and aims – Generic limits of the tropical tribe Gardenieae (Ixoroideae, Rubiaceae) have partly remained unsettled. We produced a new phylogeny of the Randia clade, with emphasis on its Neotropical clade comprising five genera (Casasia, Randia, Rosenbergiodendron, Sphinctanthus, and Tocoyena). The result was subsequently used to evaluate and discuss: a) the respective monophyly of the above-mentioned genera and their interrelationships; b) relationships within Tocoyena and the evolutionary relevance of its subgeneric classification; and c) the monophyly of the morphologically variable T. formosa.Material and methods – We examined the phylogeny of the Randia clade based on maximum likelihood and Bayesian analyses of sequence data from two nuclear (ETS and Xdh) and two plastid (petB-petD and trnT-F) DNA regions from 59 individuals (including seven representatives from the remaining Ixoroideae).Key results – The Neotropical clade of the Randia clade comprises three major lineages, the Randia armata subclade, the Randia-Casasia subclade and the Rosenbergiodendron subclade. Neither Casasia nor Randia is monophyletic. Tocoyena is sister to Rosenbergiodendron + Sphinctanthus and is subdivided into three lineages: the Tocoyena pittieri group, the Tocoyena guianensis group, and the core Tocoyena. Tocoyena williamsii is paraphyletic with respect to T. pittieri. Tocoyena formosa is polyphyletic and should be re-circumscribed.Conclusions – Our results demonstrate the monophyly of each of the relatively species-poor genera Rosenbergiodendron, Sphinctanthus, and Tocoyena, and confirm their close affinity. The serial classification of Tocoyena does not reflect the evolutionary history of the genus. The paraphyly of T. williamsii with respect to T. pittieri, together with their morphological similarities and geographic distributions, support the inclusion of the former in the latter. Our study calls for additional phylogenetic work on Casasia and the more species-rich genus Randia. While the respective monophyly of both genera is rejected here, future work with a broader representation of Randia is needed.


2015 ◽  
pp. 151-158
Author(s):  
A. Zaostrovtsev

The review considers the first attempt in the history of Russian economic thought to give a detailed analysis of informal institutions (IF). It recognizes that in general it was successful: the reader gets acquainted with the original classification of institutions (including informal ones) and their genesis. According to the reviewer the best achievement of the author is his interdisciplinary approach to the study of problems and, moreover, his bias on the achievements of social psychology because the model of human behavior in the economic mainstream is rather primitive. The book makes evident that namely this model limits the ability of economists to analyze IF. The reviewer also shares the author’s position that in the analysis of the IF genesis the economists should highlight the uncertainty and reject economic determinism. Further discussion of IF is hardly possible without referring to this book.


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