Fossil and phylogenetic analyses reveal recurrent periods of diversification and extinction in dictyopteran insects

Abstract

Variations of speciation and extinction rates determine the fate of clades through time.Periods of high diversification and extinction (possibly mass extinction events) can punctuate the evolutionary history of various clades, but they remain loosely defined for many biological groups, especially non-marine invertebrates like insects. Here, we examine whether the cockroaches, mantises and termites (altogether included in Dictyoptera) have experienced episodic pulses of speciation or extinction and how these pulses may be associated with environmental fluctuations or mass extinctions. We relied on molecular phylogeny and fossil data to shed light on the times and rates at which dictyopterans diversified. The diversification of Dictyoptera has alternated between (1) periods of high diversification in the Late Carboniferous, Early-Middle Triassic, Early Cretaceous, and middle Paleogene, and (2) periods of high extinction rates particularly at the Permian-Triassic boundary, but not necessarily correlated with the major global biodiversity crises as in the mid-Cretaceous. This study advocates on the importance of analyzing, when possible, both molecular phylogeny and fossil data to unveil diversification and extinction periods for a given group. The causes and consequences of extinction must be studied beyond mass extinction events alone to gain a broader understanding of how clades wax and wane.

Revising dating estimates and the antiquity of eusociality in termites using the fossilized birth–death process

“…Nevertheless, discrepancies exist among dating estimates for this group and its families (Evangelista et al ., 2019), whether estimated from molecular or morphological evidence. Some of the most recent phylogenetic analyses have relied on molecular data, using fossils as node calibrations only (Bourguignon et al ., 2015; Bucek et al ., 2019; Condamine et al ., 2020; Legendre et al ., 2015; Wu et al ., 2018). Others have used morphological data with fossils as terminals, but the phylogenies were built in a parsimony framework, wherein crown‐ages and stem‐ages of termite families were educated guesses (Engel et al ., 2009; Krishna et al ., 2013; Zhao et al ., 2019, 2020a).…”

The diversification of termites: Inferences from a complete species‐level phylogeny

“…Finally, Condamine et al. (2020) used an extensive analysis of fossil and phylogenetic data to explore temporal patterns of diversification in Dictyoptera, particularly with respect to the potential impacts of mass extinctions. Although their results are comprehensive and robust, they tended to focus at the level of Dictyoptera and, given that it includes groups that are vastly different in their biology, it is not clear to what extent they would reflect specifically the trends within Isoptera.…”

Early evolution of beetles regulated by the end-Permian deforestation

“…Terrestrial tetrapods and plants are considered to have been severely affected by the EPME mostly based on diversity and taxonomic composition (Benton and Newell, 2014;Viglietti et al, 2021); however, such mass extinction was questioned by a more comprehensive dataset of plant macro-and microfossils (Gastaldo, 2019;Nowak et al, 2019). Similarly, Permian insects are thought to have suffered a significant extinction (Labandeira and Sepkoski, 1993;Béthoux et al, 2005;Labandeira, 2005;Condamine et al, 2020;Condamine et al, 2016), but this was not supported by other molecular phylogenetic and fossil record analyses (Ponomarenko, 2016;Dmitriev et al, 2018;Montagna et al, 2019;Schachat et al, 2019). In addition, the ecological response of insects to the EPME remains poorly understood (Benton and Newell, 2014; Schachat and Labandeira, 2020).…”