Collaborative Research: Cretaceous Insects and the Origins of Modern Insect Diversity

在地球上35亿年的生命中，昆虫是最多样化的生物类别，对此的一个(但不是唯一的)解释是，昆虫在白垩纪作为植物食性和传粉者与植物生命的主要形式被子植物的辐射一起辐射。换句话说：昆虫可能异常多样化，因为植物加快了它们的起源或物种形成的速度。这一理论将通过研究世界各地古树脂(琥珀)中的不同昆虫化石物种来阐述，包括来自美国3个收藏品、加拿大2个收藏品和英国、西班牙、法国、俄罗斯和德国5个收藏品的数百个标本。标本的年龄从1.2亿到7000万年不等，研究将集中在双翅目(苍蝇)和膜翅目(蚂蚁、蜜蜂、黄蜂)，并对鳞翅目(蛾)和白蚁进行额外的工作。琥珀将经过精心准备，并将对昆虫包裹体进行详细的显微镜研究，以及光学显微镜照片、详细的插图和描述，然后将标本与现存物种和其他灭绝物种进行比较，以确定系统发育关系。如果被子植物影响了昆虫的进化，那么今天与被子植物关系密切的昆虫群(如五倍子和五倍子)将在晚白垩世和第三纪表现出迅速的多样化，而捕食性和食腐昆虫的多样化不应与被子植物的多样化同步。低的灭绝速度也可以增加多样性，这项研究还将讨论昆虫是否受到白垩纪-第三纪界线65 Mya灭绝的影响较小，这些灭绝杀死了其他主要的陆地生命群体。琥珀中复杂的、栩栩如生的保存提供了独特的科学和教育机会。事实上，在现存物种中发现的所有形态特征都可以在琥珀化石中看到，因此可以极其准确地测量巨大时间范围内的变化量，并辨别已灭绝生命形式的关系。有了这一点，科学家们就可以直接面对关于化石记录不完整的批评，因为它揭示了进化变化。此外，保存在琥珀中的化石的美学吸引力使公众参与到昆虫多样性、化石、进化和一般生命历史，以及生物学和地球历史之间的界面。除了对学生进行系统学、昆虫学和古生物学的正规教育外，这项研究还将通过一个新的网站和流行出版物来促进非正规科学教育。

Insects are the most diverse class of organisms in the 3.5 billion years of life on earth, and one (but not exclusive) explanation for this is that insects radiated in the Cretaceous as plant feeders and pollinators along with the radiation of the dominant form of plant life, the angiosperms. In other words: insects may be exceptionally diverse because plants speeded their rate of origin or speciation. This theory will be addressed by studying diverse species of insects fossilized in ancient resin (amber) from around the world, including hundreds of specimens from 3 collections in the United States, 2 in Canada, and 5 in the UK, Spain, France, Russia, and Germany. Specimens range in age from 120 to 70 million years old, and study will focus on the megadiverse orders Diptera (flies) and Hymenoptera (ants, bees, wasps), with additional work on the Lepidoptera (moths) and termites. The amber will be meticulously prepared and detailed microscopic study will be made of the insect inclusions, along with photomicrographs, detailed illustrations and descriptions, and the specimens will then be compared to living and other extinct species to determine phylogenetic relationships. If angiosperms affected the evolution of insects, then groups of insects that today are intimately associated with angiosperms (like gall midges and gall wasps) will show rapid diversification in the Late Cretaceous and Tertiary, whereas the diversification of predatory and scavenger insects should not be timed to that of angiosperms. A low rate of extinction can also increase diversity, and this study will also address whether insects were less affected by extinctions at the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary 65 mya that killed off other major groups of terrestrial life. The intricate, life-like preservation in amber provides unique scientific and educational opportunities. Virtually all morphological characters found in living species are visible in amber fossils, thus allowing profoundly accurate measures of the amount of change over vast expanses of time and discerning the relationships of extinct life forms. With this, scientists can directly confront criticisms about the incompleteness of the fossil record for revealing evolutionary change. Also, the esthetic appeal of fossils preserved in amber engages the public with insect diversity, fossils, evolution and the history of life in general, as well as with the interface between biology and earth history. Besides the formal education of students in systematics, entomology, and paleontology, this research will promote informal science education through a new web site and popular publications.