Abstract
Interspecific variations of legs’ morphometric signs have been investigated on 2885 individuals from 65 species of 22 genera of the family Dolichopodidae. Nine morphometric signs of legs, including lengths of femora, tibia, and first segment of tarsi have been measured, and the data on 12 relative signs have been obtained. The results of analysis of variance showed significant differences between the genera but not between the subfamilies. Most of the studied signs showed weak phylogenetic signal. Significant phylogenetic signal has been found in only one of the studied signs: the ratio of length of mid legs' femora and tibia. Principal component analysis revealed the set of characters most typical for the family representatives as well as two general trends in leg morphometry diversity: elongation of the first segment of the mid- and hind-legs and variation in the ratio of fore-, mid-, and hind-femora. Cluster analysis revealed three morphologically distinguishable species groups that also differed in terms of their microhabitats: Medetera-like species (lengths of fore-, mid-, and hind-femora are nearly equal), Hydrophorus-like species (mid- and hind-femora and tibia are significantly extended regarding the fore-femora and tibia), and Sciapus-like species (all first segments of tarsi are significantly extended). Each of the identified groups includes species belonging to different subfamilies. Therefore, the similarity in leg morphometry features in dolichopodids is supported to be related to convergent evolution and not to the presence of a common ancestor with a similar morphology.
Similar content being viewed by others
REFERENCES
Vasil'ev, A.G., Vasil’eva, A.I., and Shkurikhin, A.O., Geometricheskaya morfometriya: Ot teorii k praktike (Geometric Morphometry: From Theory to Practice), Moscow: Tov. Nauchn. Izd. KMK, 2018.
Schutze, M.K., Jessup, A., and Clarke, A.R., Wing shape as a potential discriminator of morphologically similar pest taxa within the Bactrocera dorsalis species complex (Diptera: Tephritidae), Bull. Entomol. Res., 2012, vol. 102, no. 1, pp. 103–111.
Tran, A.K., Hutchison, W.D., and Asplen, M.K., Morphometric criteria to differentiate Drosophila suzukii (Diptera: Drosophilidae), PLoS ONE, 2020, vol. 15, no. 2.
Akhmetkireeva, T.T., Ben’kovskaya, G.V., and Vasil’ev, A.G., Variability of wing shape and size in Musca domestica L. lines selected for life expectancy: Geometric morphometry, Ekol. Genet., 2018, vol. 16, no. 1, pp. 35–44.
Jamillo, N., Castillo, D., and Wolff, M.E., Geometric morphometric differences between Panstrongylus geniculatus from field and laboratory, Mem. Inst. Oswaldo Cruz, 2002, vol. 97, no. 5, pp. 667–673.
Klingenberg, C.P. and Gidaszewski, N.A., Testing and quantifying phylogenetic signals and homoplasy in morphometric data, Syst. Biol., 2010, vol. 59, no. 3, pp. 245–261.
Pepinelli, M., Spironello, M., and Currie, D.C., Geometric morphometrics as a tool for interpreting evolutionary transitions in the black fly wing (Diptera: Simuliidae), Zool. J. Linnean Soc., 2013, vol. 169, no. 2, pp. 377–388.
Land, M.F., Chasing and pursuit in the dolichopodid fly Poecilobothrus nobilitatus,J. Comp. Physiol., 1993, vol. 173, no. 5, pp. 605–613.
Negrobov, O.P. and Shtakel’berg, A.A., Dolichopodidae, in Opredelitel’ nasekomykh Evropeiskoi chasti SSSR (Keys to Insects of the European Part of the USSR), Bei-Bienko, G.Ya., Ed., Leningrad: Nauka, 1969, vol. 5, no. 1, pp. 670–752.
Sivinski, J., Ornaments in the Diptera, Fla. Entomol., 1997, vol. 80, no. 2, pp. 142–164.
Stubbs, A., Courtships of Dolichopus plumipes (Scop) (Dolichopodidae), Dipterists Digest, 1988, vol. 1, p. 43.
Daugeron, C., Plant, A., Winkler, I., Stark, A., and Baylac, M., Extreme male leg polymorphic asymmetry in a new Empididae dance fly (Diptera: Empididae), Biol. Lett., 2011, vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 11–14.
Negrobov, O.P. and Chursina, M.A., Signs of the genus level in the legs morphology of Dolichopodidae (Diptera), Int. J. Sci. Res., 2013, vol. 24, no. 2, pp. 59–64.
Schindelin, J., Rueden, C.T., Hiner, M.C., and Eliceiri, K.W., The ImageJ ecosystem: An open platform for biomedical image analysis, Mol. Reprod. Dev., 2015, vol. 82, nos. 7–8, pp. 518–529.
GenBank. National Center for Biotechnology Information. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/. Accessed May 1, 2020.
Bernasconi, M.V., Pollet, M., Varini-Ooijen, M., and Ward, P.I., Molecular systematic of Dolichopodidae (Diptera) inferred from COI and 12S rDNA gene sequences based on European exemplars, Invertebr. Syst., 2007, vol. 21, no. 5, pp. 453–470.
Kumar, S., Stecher, G., Li, M., Knyaz, C., and Tamura, K., MEGA X: Molecular evolutionary genetics analysis across computing platforms, Mol. Biol. Evol., 2018, vol. 35, no. 6, pp. 1547–1549.
Klingenberg, C.P., MorphoJ: An integrated software package for geometric morphometrics, Mol. Ecol. Resour., 2011, vol. 11, no. 2, pp. 353–357.
Pagel, M., Inferring the historical patterns of biological evolution, Nature, 1999, vol. 401, no. 6756, pp. 677–884.
Revell, L.J., Phytools: An R package for phylogenetic comparative biology (and other things), Methods Ecol. Evol., 2012, vol. 3, no. 2, pp. 217–223.
Negrobov, O.P., Little-known species of the subfamily Medeterinae (Diptera, Dolichopodidae) of the fauna of the USSR, Vestn. Zool., 1971, no. 5, pp. 43–46.
Funding
This work was financially supported by the Russian Science Foundation and the China National Natural Science Foundation (project no. 20-54-53005).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interests. The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Statement on the welfare of animals. All applicable international, national, and/or institutional guidelines for the care and use of animals were followed.
Additional information
Translated by T. Kuznetsova
About this article
Cite this article
Chursina, M.A., Negrobov, O.P. Morphometric Variations in Leg Segments’ Length in the Family Dolichopodidae (Diptera). Moscow Univ. Biol.Sci. Bull. 75, 110–116 (2020). https://doi.org/10.3103/S0096392520030049
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3103/S0096392520030049