Unraveling the diversification history of grasshoppers belonging to the “ Trimerotropis pallidipennis” (Oedipodinae: Acrididae) species group: a hotspot of biodiversity in the Central Andes

PeerJ

article

Noelia Verónica Guzmán¹  Silvia Mónica Pietrokovsky¹  Maria Marta Cigliano²  Viviana Andrea Confalonieri¹ 

[1] Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales, Universidad de Buenos Aires y Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Tecnológicas, Instituto de Ecología;Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Tecnológicas, Museo de La Plata, Universidad Nacional de la Plata

关键词: Species delimitation;    Grasshopper;    Biogeography;    Phylogenetic;   

DOI  :  10.7717/peerj.3835

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Inra

【 摘 要 】

The Andean Mountain range has been recognized as one of the biodiversity hotspots of the world. The proposed mechanisms for such species diversification, among others, are due to the elevation processes occurring during the Miocene and the intensive glacial action during the Pleistocene. In this study we investigated the diversification history of the grasshopper Trimerotropis pallidipennis species complex which shows a particularly wide latitudinal and altitudinal distribution range across the northern, central and southern Andes in South America. Many genetic lineages of this complex have been so far discovered, making it an excellent model to investigate the role of the central Andes Mountains together with climatic fluctuations as drivers of speciation. Phylogenetics, biogeographic and molecular clock analyses using a multi-locus dataset revealed that in Peru there are at least two, and possibly four genetic lineages. Two different stocks originated from a common ancestor from North/Central America—would have dispersed toward southern latitudes favored by the closure of the Panama Isthmus giving rise to two lineages, the coastal and mountain lineages, which still coexist in Peru (i.e., T. pallidipennis and T. andeana). Subsequent vicariant and dispersal events continued the differentiation process, giving rise to three to six genetic lineages (i.e., clades) detected in this study, which were geographically restricted to locations dispersed over the central Andes Mountains in South America. Our results provide another interesting example of “island diversification” motored by the topography plus unstable climatic conditions during the Pleistocene, pointing out the presence of a hotspot of diversification in the Andean region of Peru.

【 授权许可】

CC BY