Systematics and Evolution of Subsaharan Pholcus spiders and potential close relatives

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With currently 124 described species, Pholcus is the largest genus in the spider family Pholcidae, with the type species Pholcus phalangioides one of the commonest house spiders in Europe and a valued model species. However, the group as such has been neglected for many decades. In fact, no revision has ever been done of the genus, and few taxonomists remain worldwide with relevant expertise to do such a long overdue revision.Pholcids are largely restricted to undisturbed tropical and subtropical forests. Their highest biodiversity thus concentrates in those areas worldwide that are most severely threatened by deforestation. Unpublished material from museums and from recent expeditions documents an unforeseen species richness of the genus Pholcus. For example, only 23 species of Pholcus and of the potential close relative Leptopholcus are currently known from Subsaharan Africa, but about 100 species are present in collections seen so far by the applicant.The aim of this study is to document and analyse the biodiversity of Subsaharan Pholcus and potential close relatives. The basis of such a revision are morphological species descriptions, including ultrastructure, analysis of variation, and cladistic analysis of morphological characters. This will be combined with phylogenetic analyses based on molecular data and with molecular taxonomy as a means to test species boundaries hypothesized from morphology. Funding is sought for three main aspects: 1) expeditions to acquire material suited for molecular analyses; 2) a student research assistant for routine work in the molecular lab; 3) consumables for molecular work.