EVALUATION OF DIFFERENT TAXONOMIC LEVELS AS SURROGATES OF ANT DIVERSITY IN GREEN AREAS IN AN URBANIZED ENVIRONMENT E. B. A. KOCH1, T. S. MELO2,3,4, A. R. S. ANDRADE2,3, M. LEPONCE5 & J. H. C. DELABIE2,4 1Programa de Pós-graduação em Ecologia e Evolução, Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana (UEFS), CEP: 44.036-900 - Feira de Santana, Bahia, Brazil, e-mail: elmoborges@gmail.com; 2Programa de Pós-graduação em Ecologia, Universidade Federal da Bahia (UFBA), Salvador, Bahia, Brazil; 3Centro de Ecologia e Conservação Animal, Universidade Católica do Salvador (UCSal), Salvador, Bahia, Brazil; 4Laboratório de Mirmecologia, Convênio Universidade Estadual de Santa Cruz (UESC)/Comissão Executiva do Plano da Lavoura Cacaueira (CEPLAC), Ilhéus, Bahia, Brazil; 5Biodiversity Monitoring & Assessment, Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (RBINS), Bruxelas, Belgium. In cities located in environments of high biological importance, urbanization leads to changes in biotic diversity, while monitoring these changes can be difficult. Studies have pointed to the use of metrics that replace species as an alternative. Surrogate models are easily determined measures of biodiversity that correlate strongly with species richness and with what you want to investigate, being useful for detecting or monitoring environmental changes. The use of higher taxonomic levels has been applied to groups of megadiverse organisms, such as arthropods, since difficulties in identifying species are predictable. The aim of this study was to evaluate the practicality of using taxonomic diversity of ants as a surrogate of green area coverage in an urban environment. Four levels of "surrogate resolutions" (subfamily, genus, indicator taxa, and intermediate resolution) were assessed to the taxonomic diversity of ants across three levels of urban green areas (Small = 0 to 35%
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RBINS Staff Publications 2023
Eurythenes gryllus (Lichtenstein, 1822) is a presumed cosmopolitan eurybathic benthopelagic giant deep-sea amphipod. However, previous studies already highlighted genetically divergent lineages in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, which appeared to be vertically stratified, and minor morphological differences between populations were also recorded. With an aim to quantify the geographic and bathymetric patterns of genetic variations, the genetic diversity in Eurythenes gryllus was investigated at the global scale (Arctic, Atlantic, Pacific and Southern Oceans) using three different genes (COI, 16S rRNA, 285 rRNA). This genetic analysis was accompanied by a thorough morphological study. Phylogenetic and phylogeographic analyses revealed the existence of at least eight well-supported clades, two bathyal and six abyssal, which were separated by genetic distances at the level of usual interspecific divergences. A subsequent morphological analysis confirmed the genetic findings and revealed small but consistent differences between the different clades, which will be described as separate species. Furthermore, a clear genetic break was observed between specimens sampled above and below 3000 m. This bathymetric break below 3000 m has already been reported for several organisms and regions, suggesting its role as a ubiquitous phylogeographic barrier for barophysical tolerance. The Eurythenes clade, comprising specimens sampled at bathyal sites in the Arctic and Southern Oceans, is presumably the true E. gryllus. This represents, to our knowledge, the first molecular evidence for a bipolar distribution in a macro-benthic deep-sea organism. The present results clearly highlight the difficult nature of research on the systematics of deep-sea crustaceans and shows that the abyss is a more complex environment than previously assumed, likely to harbour an important hidden diversity.
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