CAREER: Systematics Research and Training in the Flies of the Culicoidea (Diptera: Culicomorpha)

darlene D. judd博士；俄勒冈州立大学（Oregon State University）的达琳·d·贾德（Darlene D. Judd）获得了一项为期五年的职业生涯资助，该资助将为两名博士生和两名硕士生提供一项新的研究和培训计划，以对与人类健康主要相关的四个未被充分研究的苍蝇家族进行系统研究。每个学生的研究将集中在库蠓科（双翅目：库蠓科）中的一个科，或一个科中的一个小的自然群体，我们对它们的关系知之甚少。专著将提供每个群体的全面全球覆盖，并将包括对命名法的处理，所有生命阶段的物种描述，信息特征系统的插图，以及分布和生活史信息。识别密钥和标本/数字图像数据库将在WWW上提供。每一项研究都将提供形态学和分子特征数据，这些数据将使用分支学方法进行组合和分析。之所以选择这四个蝇科，是因为它们表现出的特征组合表明它们在库利虫科（人类疾病最重要的媒介）中的位置不稳定，但对更高的分类和关注苍蝇吸血进化的问题具有根本的兴趣。苍蝇是地球上最成功的分类类群之一，在农业害虫、人类和动物健康问题、营养循环和生物多样性的讨论中占有突出地位。尽管它们很重要，但苍蝇和它们的近亲之间的关系是有争议的。迄今为止，对原始蝇类（如蚊子、小蚊、黑蝇、扁蝇）的形态学研究在系统发育分析中严重依赖于地平面编码，而分子研究则经常受到分类单元采样问题的困扰。这项职业基金将把分类学研究、研究生教育和自然历史收藏方面的现代方法整合到一个项目中，为解决最重要的鼠疫蝇系之一的问题提供坚实的基础。

DEB-0093392Darlene D. JuddDr. Darlene D. Judd of Oregon State University has been awarded a five-year CAREER grant that will support a novel research and training program for two Ph.D. students and two M.S. students to undertake systematics research on four families of understudied flies of prime relevance to human health. Each student's research will focus on one of the families in the Culicoidea (Diptera: Culicomorpha), or a small natural group within a family, for which we have little understanding of relationships. Monographs will provide comprehensive global coverage of each group and will include treatment of nomenclature, descriptions of species for all life stages, illustrations of informative character systems, and distribution and life history information. Identification keys and specimen/digital image databases will be made available on WWW. Each of these studies will contribute morphological and molecular character data that will be combined and analyzed using cladistics methods. These four fly families were chosen because the combination of characters they display suggests their positions within the Culicomorpha (the most important vectors of human disease) are unstable, yet of fundamental interest to higher classification and questions focusing on the evolution of blood-feeding in flies.Flies are one of the most successful taxonomic groups on the planet and figure prominently in discussions of agricultural pests, issues in human and animal health, nutrient cycling and biodiversity. Despite their importance, relationships among flies and their close relatives are controversial. Morphological studies to date in the primitive flies (e.g. mosquitoes, gnats, black flies, punkies) have relied heavily on groundplan coding in phylogenetic analyses, while molecular studies are often plagued by problems in taxon sampling. This CAREER grant will integrate modern methods in taxonomic research, graduate education and natural history collections into a program that provides a firm foundation for solving problems on one of the most important lineages of pestiferous flies.