Collaborative Research: Systematics and Evolutionary Biology of the Drosophila Quinaria Species Group

小行星9629517 该奖项将支持大卫格里马尔迪博士对与格雷格斯派塞博士合作进行的研究项目的贡献。 Grimaldi将利用形态学、生态学和行为学的信息，为一组果蝇，果蝇种组（昆虫纲：双翅目：果蝇科），推导出物种之间的关系。 他还将对该群体进行地理分析，该群体主要分布在泛北极地区，但确实包括一个来自中国的未知隶属关系的单一描述物种，这可能代表该地区未描述物种的冰山一角。 格里马尔迪的研究结果将与斯派塞的研究结果相结合，斯派塞将对这些相同的物种进行分子系统发育分析。 目前，该群体的规模是可管理的，有28个描述的物种，在栖息地和繁殖地显示出有趣的生物多样性。 希望相结合的形态学和分子证据将导致一个完全解决的进化，在未来，可用于解决几个有趣的进化问题，包括决定因素的果蝇宿主范围内的寄生线虫和系统发育的限制转移到一个新的生态位，如蘑菇育种蘑菇毒素的耐受性可能伴随着变化。 该奖项将有助于我们了解昆虫生物多样性的一个要素，并开始提供有关物种如何随着时间的推移改变习性和宿主协会的信息。

9629517 GRIMALDI This award will support Dr. David Grimaldi's contribution to a research project being done in collaboration with Dr. Greg Spicer. Grimaldi will utilize morphological, ecological, and behavioral information for a group of flies, the Drosophila quinaria species group (Insecta: Diptera: Drosophilidae), to derive a phylogeny of relationships among the species. He will also pursue a biogeographic analysis of the group which is largely Holarctic in distribution but does include a single described species of unknown affiliation from China that may represent the tip of an iceberg of undescribed species from that region. Grimaldi's results will be integrated with those of Spicer who will pursue a molecular phylogenetic analysis of these same species. At present, the group is of a manageable size, with 28 described species that show interesting biological diversity in habitat and breeding sites. It is hoped that the combined morphological and molecular evidence will result in a fully resolved phylogeny that, in the future, can be used to address several interesting evolutionary questions, including determinants of Drosophila host range in parasitic nematodes and phylogenetic constraints on shifting to a new ecological niche such as mushroom breeding with possible concomitant shifts in tolerance of mushroom toxins. This award will contribute to our understanding of an element of insect biodiversity and begin to provide information concerning how species change habit and host associations through time.