Two new species of Limbodessus diving beetles from New Guinea - short verbal descriptions flanked by online content (digital photography, μCT scans, drawings and DNA sequence data)

Abstract

BackgroundTo date only one species of Limbodessus diving beetles has been reported from the Island of New Guinea, L. compactus (Clark, 1862), which is widerspread in the Australian region.New informationWe describe two new species of microendemic New Guinea Limbodessus and use a compact descriptive format flanked by enriched online content in wiki powered species pages. Limbodessus baliem sp.n. is described from ca. 1,600 m altitude in the Baliem Valley of Papua and Limbodessus alexanderi sp.n. from >3,000 m altitude north of Sugapa, Papua.Based on our analysis, we also transfer three species from other genera to Limbodessus Guignot, 1939, with the following changes: Limbodessus deflectus (Ordish, 1966), new combination; Limbodessus leveri (J. Balfour-Browne, 1944), new combination; and Limbodessus plicatus (Sharp, 1882), new combination.

The “minute diving beetles” of southern Australia – taxonomic revision of Gibbidessus Watts, 1978, with description of six new species (Coleoptera, Dytiscidae, Bidessini)

“…This had to lead to the recognition of genera that render others paraphyletic (Balke and Ribera 2004). Some of these features, such as presence / absence of an elytral plica or occipital line, have been shown to vary within clades of closely related species (Balke et al 2015). In this context, the use of phylogenetic reconstructions based on DNA sequence data offers a source of information that helps to delineate monophyletic entities (Hendrich and Balke 2009;Balke et al 2013).…”

A new genus and two new species of Southeast Asian Bidessini as well as new synonyms for Oceanian species (Coleoptera, Dytiscidae)

“…Bidessini genera have to date been justified mainly on a diagnostic combination of structural features (Biström 1988; Balke et al 2002; Miller and Short 2015; Miller and Bergsten 2016) rather than apomorphies and this had to lead to recognition of genera that render other paraphyletic (Balke and Ribera 2004). Some of these features such as presence / absence of elytral striae (plicae) or occipital line have been shown to vary within clades of closely related species (Balke et al 2015) or even within one species (Balke unpublished). In this context, the use of phylogenetic reconstructions based on DNA sequence data offers a source of information that helps to delineate monophyletic entities (Hendrich and Balke 2009; Balke et al 2013).…”