Morphometric characters in phylogeny: a case study of Desmothrips(Thysanoptera: Aeolothripidae)

GANDOLFO, RAQUEL; PEREYRA, VERONICA; CATALANO, SANTIAGO ANDRÉS

Rostock

Congreso; XXXIII Meeting de la Sociedad Willi Hennig; 2013

Universidad de Rostock

The australian genus Desmothrips is one of the most diverse genera in Aeolothripidae (Terebrantia: Thysanoptera) with 18 described species. The only phylogenetic analysis performed for this genus employed conventional morphological characters and recovered the monophyly of the group, but with low support values. The use of geometric morphometric in phylogenetic analyses is an emerging field of study that showed to help to establish the phylogenetic relationship between the members of different taxa. The objective of this work is to test the influence of landmark configurations in the resolution of the phylogenetic relationship between the members of Desmothrips. A data matrix with 58 continuous, discrete, and morphometric characters was analyzed under the parsimony criteria. The 18 species of Desmothrips were included in the analysis. Seven species of Stomatothrips and two species of Aeolothrips were included as the outgroup. Nine configurations describing the shape of head, mesosterno, forewing, and antennal segments were codified. Additionally, the terminal abdominal segments for females, and the abdominal tergite I for males were included. Two analyses were conducted in TNT: one including discrete, continuous and morphometric data sets; and a second with only the morphometric data set. This study demonstrates the utility of including new sources of evidence in order to establish phylogenetic relationship between the members of Thysanoptera.