The phylogeny and limits of Elateridae (Insecta, Coleoptera): is there a common tendency of click beetles to soft‐bodiedness and neoteny?

Abstract

Kundrata, R. & Bocak, L. (2011). The phylogeny and limits of Elateridae (Insecta, Coleoptera): is there a common tendency of click beetles to soft-bodiedness and neoteny? -Zoologica Scripta, 40, 364-378. Phylogenetic relationships in Elateroidea were investigated using partial 18S and 28S rDNA and rrnl and cox1 mtDNA sequences with special interest in the phylogeny of Elateridae and the position of soft-bodied lineages Drilidae and Omalisidae that had been classified as families in the cantharoid lineage of Elateroidea until recently. Females in these groups are neotenic and almost completely larviform (Drilidae) or brachypterous (Omalisidae). The newly sequenced individuals of Elateridae, Drilidae, Omalisidae and Eucnemidae were merged with previously published datasets and analysed matrices include either 155 taxa with the complete representation of fragments or 210 taxa when some fragments were missing. The main feature of inferred phylogenetic trees was the monophyly of Phengodidae + Rhagophthalmidae + Omalisidae + Elateridae + Drilidae with Omalisidae regularly occupying a basal node in the group; Drilidae were embedded as a terminal lineage in the elaterid subfamily Agrypninae and soft-bodied Cebrioninae were a part of Elaterinae. The soft-bodied males and incompletely metamorphosed females originated at least three times within the wider Elateridae clade. Their atypical morphology has been considered as a result of long evolutionary history and they were given an inappropriately high rank in the previous classifications. The frequent origins of these modifications seem to be connected with modifications of the hormonal regulation of the metamorphosis. The superficial similarity with other soft-bodied lineages, such as Cantharidae, Lycidae, Lampyridae, Phengodidae and Rhagophthalmidae is supposed to be a result of homoplasious modifications of the ancestral elateroid morphology due to the incomplete metamorphosis. The results of phylogenetic analyses are translated in the formal taxonomic classification. Most Drilidae are placed in Elateridae as a tribe Drilini in Agrypninae, whilst Pseudeuanoma and Euanoma are transferred from Drilidae to Omalisidae. The subfamily Cebrioninae is placed in Elaterinae as tribes Cebrionini and Aplastini. Oxynopterini, Pityobiini and Semiotini are lowered from the subfamily rank to tribes and classified in Denticollinae.

Building the Coleoptera tree‐of‐life for >8000 species: composition of public DNA data and fit with Linnaean classification

“…The amount of data for Buprestoidea remains low, which may explain the difficulty of placing them correctly. The current tree supports the monophyly of Elateroidea sensu Bocakova et al () and Kundrata & Bocak (), which includes the soft‐bodied families formerly grouped as Cantharoidea (Lawrence & Newton, ). The cantharoid families were never found as a monophylum, and Omethidae and Telegeusidae represent basal splits, whereas Cantharidae, Lampyridae and Lycidae are more closely related to Elateridae (Fig.…”

“…molecular systematics of particular beetle families (e.g. Robertson et al , ; Marvaldi et al , ), composition of local faunas (Pons et al , ; Monaghan et al , ), phylogeography (Ribera & Balke, ; Papadopoulou et al , ), DNA identification of immature stages (Ahrens et al , ), studies of adaptive traits (Kundrata & Bocak, ) and macroevolution (Gomez‐Zurita et al , ; McKenna & Farrell, ). The diverse aims of the original studies resulted in the erratic use of several different loci.…”

World reclassification of the Cardiophorinae (Coleoptera, Elateridae), based on phylogenetic analyses of morphological characters

“…Previous studies indicated the Negastriinae were the sister group to (Sagegami-Oba et al 2007; Oba 2007; Kundrata and Bocak 2011; and Kundrata et al 2016), or rendered paraphyletic by (Douglas 2011) the Cardiophorinae. Because of this, exemplars of the type species 15 of 30 world negastriine genera, and one non-type species, were included to further test cardiophorine monophyly.…”

Millipede assassins and allies (Heteroptera: Reduviidae: Ectrichodiinae, Tribelocephalinae): total evidence phylogeny, revised classification and evolution of sexual dimorphism

“…In beetles, extreme sexual dimorphism (e.g. larviform females) evolved multiple times from limited sexual dimorphism, resulting in convergent larviform female morphology of distantly related taxa (Bocakova et al ., ; Kundrata & Bocak, ). Transitions between limited and extreme sexual dimorphism have otherwise been little studied, and it is unclear if the pattern observed in elaterid beetles is also found in other groups of insects.…”