Three New Species of Phytotelm-Breeding Melanophryniscus from the Atlantic Rainforest of Southern Brazil (Anura: Bufonidae)

Bornschein, Marcos R.; Firkowski, Carina R.; Baldo, Diego; Ribeiro, Luiz Fernando; Belmonte-Lopes, Ricardo; Corrêa, Leandro; Morato, Sérgio Augusto Abrahão; Pie, Márcio R.

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0142791

Cited by 26 publications

(38 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…The region currently remains in constant degradation, mostly fragmented into isolated archipelagos of small forest fragments surrounded by open-habitat www.nature.com/scientificreports www.nature.com/scientificreports/ matrices, with only less than 10% of its original coverage 25,41,42 and only about a third of its total extent preserved by conservation units 24 . Nevertheless, even those remaining forest fragments still harbor a multitude of newly discovered animal taxa including both vertebrates [43][44][45] and invertebrates [46][47][48][49][50][51] . Currently, the largest and best preserved portions of the Brazilian Atlantic rainforest are situated near the southern mountain ranges including Serras do Mar and da Mantiqueira 42 , where all Jurasaidae known thus far were collected.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hidden diversity in the Brazilian Atlantic rainforest: the discovery of Jurasaidae, a new beetle family (Coleoptera, Elateroidea) with neotenic females

Rosa

Costa

Kramp

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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Beetles are the most species-rich animal radiation and are among the historically most intensively studied insect groups. consequently, the vast majority of their higher-level taxa had already been described about a century ago. In the 21st century, thus far, only three beetle families have been described de novo based on newly collected material. Here, we report the discovery of a completely new lineage of soft-bodied neotenic beetles from the Brazilian Atlantic rainforest, which is one of the most diverse and also most endangered biomes on the planet. We identified three species in two genera, which differ in morphology of all life stages and exhibit different degrees of neoteny in females. We provide a formal description of this lineage for which we propose the new family Jurasaidae. Molecular phylogeny recovered Jurasaidae within the basal grade in elateroidea, sister to the well-sclerotized rare click beetles, cerophytidae. this placement is supported by several larval characters including the modified mouthparts. The discovery of a new beetle family, which is due to the limited dispersal capability and cryptic lifestyle of its wingless females bound to long-term stable habitats, highlights the importance of the Brazilian Atlantic rainforest as a top priority area for nature conservation.Coleoptera (beetles) is by far the largest insect order by number of described species. Approximately 400,000 species have been described, and many new ones are still frequently being discovered even in regions with historically high collecting activity 1 . Because this group has been intensively studied since the age of early systematists, and most of the major higher-level taxa had already been described by about a century ago, discoveries of new beetle families are nowadays a rare occurrence. The vast majority of recent family descriptions is based on the already known taxa for which a new systematic placement was recovered by the use of phylogenetic analyses 2-5 . Thus, only three beetle families have been erected de novo in the 21st century based on newly collected material. Firstly, Aspidytidae were described based on two species from South Africa and China, which currently represent monotypic genera 6,7 . Secondly, the monotypic family Meruidae was created for a hitherto undescribed lineage from Venezuela 8 . Finally, the new monogeneric family Iberobaeniidae was described based on three species from the southern part of the Iberian Peninsula 9,10 . Whereas both Aspidytidae and Meruidae represent semiaquatic families within the suborder Adephaga, Iberobaeniidae were recovered as a deep branch in the polyphagan superfamily Elateroidea 9 .Elateroidea (the click-beetles, soldier-beetles, fireflies and relatives), the largest superfamily of the series Elateriformia, form one of the major and oldest polyphagan lineages 11,12 . Currently, they contain approximately 25,000 described species classified into 13 families [13][14][15][16] . The elateroid beetles exhibit extraordinary morphological diversity. Some lineages contai...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hidden diversity in the Brazilian Atlantic rainforest: the discovery of Jurasaidae, a new beetle family (Coleoptera, Elateroidea) with neotenic females

Rosa

Costa

Kramp

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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“…In the present study, we describe a new species of the pernix species group from northeastern state of Santa Catarina, southern Brazil. This discovery is part of a continuing effort to investigate montane anurans of southern Brazil (see Bornschein et al, 2015; Bornschein et al, 2016; Pie & Ribeiro, 2015; Ribeiro et al, 2015; Firkowski et al, 2016). …”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A new species ofBrachycephalus(Anura: Brachycephalidae) from Santa Catarina, southern Brazil

Bornschein

Ribeiro

Blackburn

et al. 2016

PeerJ

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A new species of Brachycephalus (Anura: Brachycephalidae) is described from the Atlantic Forest of northeastern state of Santa Catarina, southern Brazil. Nine specimens (eight adults and a juvenile) were collected from the leaf litter of montane forests 790–835 m above sea level (a.s.l.). The new species is a member of the pernix group by its bufoniform shape and the absence of dermal co-ossification and is distinguished from all its congeners by a combination of its general coloration (dorsal region of head, dorsum, legs, arms, and flanks light, brownish green to dark, olive green, with darker region in the middle of the dorsum and a white line along the vertebral column in most specimens) and by its smooth dorsum. The geographical distribution of the new species is highly reduced (extent of occurrence estimated as 25.04 ha, or possibly 34.37 ha). In addition, its habitat has experienced some level of degradation, raising concerns about the future conservation of the species. Preliminary density estimates suggest one calling individual every 3–4 m2 at 815–835 m a.s.l. and every 100 m2 at 790 m a.s.l. Together with the recently described B. boticario and B. fuscolineatus, the new species is among the southernmost species of Brachycephalus known to date.

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“…The most remarkable feature of this genus is their extreme level of miniaturization (SVL≈1-1.5 cm), which has led to severe modifications of their body plan, such as the reduction in the number of digits (Hanken and Wake, 1993;Yeh, 2002). The distribution of montane species of Melanophryniscus and Brachycephalus overlap broadly across the southern Serra do Mar, with many pairs of species of each genus being found on the same mountains (Pie et al, 2013;Bornschein et al, 2015;2016a;Firkowski et al, 2016). This condition of co-distributed microendemism provides a unique opportunity to investigate the timing of and the mechanisms driving their evolution.…”

Section: Melanophryniscus Is Widely Distributed Throughout Southeastementioning

confidence: 99%

Phylogenomics of montane frogs of the Brazilian Atlantic Forest supports a scenario of isolation in sky islands followed by relative climatic stability

Pie

Faircloth²,

Ribeiro

et al. 2017

Preprint

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Despite encompassing a relatively small geographical area, montane regions harbor disproportionately high levels of species diversity and endemism. Yet, relatively little is known about the evolutionary mechanisms ultimately leading to montane diversity. In this study, we use target capture of ultraconserved elements to investigate the phylogenetic relationships and diversification patterns of Melanophryniscus (Bufonidae) and Brachycephalus (Brachycephalidae), two frog genera that occur in sky islands of the southern Atlantic Forest of Brazil. Specifically, we test whether diversification of montane species in these genera can be explained by a single climatic shift leading to isolation in sky islands, followed by relative climatic stability that maintained populations in allopatry. In both genera, the topologies inferred using concatenation and coalescent-based methods were concordant and had strong nodal support, except for a few recent splits. These recent splits tended to be supported by more informative loci (those with higher average bootstrap support), suggesting that, while individual trees may be well resolved, the relationships they recover are being obscured by non-informative data.Divergence dating of a combined dataset using both genera is consistent with concordant timing of their diversification. These results support the scenario of diversification-by-isolation in sky islands, and suggest that allopatry due to climatic gradients in montane regions are an important mechanism for generating species diversity and endemism in these regions.

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Three New Species of Phytotelm-Breeding Melanophryniscus from the Atlantic Rainforest of Southern Brazil (Anura: Bufonidae)

Cited by 26 publications

References 22 publications

Hidden diversity in the Brazilian Atlantic rainforest: the discovery of Jurasaidae, a new beetle family (Coleoptera, Elateroidea) with neotenic females

Hidden diversity in the Brazilian Atlantic rainforest: the discovery of Jurasaidae, a new beetle family (Coleoptera, Elateroidea) with neotenic females

A new species ofBrachycephalus(Anura: Brachycephalidae) from Santa Catarina, southern Brazil

Phylogenomics of montane frogs of the Brazilian Atlantic Forest supports a scenario of isolation in sky islands followed by relative climatic stability

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