Li Baoping, Liu Zhiwei, Zheng Zhe-Min
Department of Entomology, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China.
Zookeys. 2011(148):209-55. doi: 10.3897/zookeys.148.2081. Epub 2011 Nov 21.
The grasshopper family Catantopidae is a well-known group, whose members include some of the most notorious agricultural pests. The existing classifications of the family are mostly utilitarian rather than being based on phylogenetic analysis and therefore unable to provide the stability desired for such an economically important group. In the present study, we present the first comprehensive phylogenetic analysis of the family based on morphology. By extensively sampling from the Chinese fauna, we included in the present analysis multiple representatives of each of the previously recognized tribes in the family. In total, we examined 94 genera represented by 240 species and evaluated 116 characters, including 84 for external morphology and 32 for male genitalia. The final matrix consists of 86 ingroup taxa and 88 characters. Our phylogenetic analyses resulted in a high resolution of the basal relationships of the family while showed considerable uncertainty about the relationships among some crown taxa. We further evaluated the usefulness of morphological characters in phylogeny reconstruction of the catantopids by examining character fit to the shortest trees found, and contrary to previous suggestions, our results suggest that genitalia characters are not as informative as external morphology in inferring higher-level relationship. We further suggest that earlier classification systems of grasshoppers in general and Catantopidae in particular most probably consist of many groups that are not natural due the heavy reliance on genitalia features and need to be revised in the light of future phylogenetic studies. Finally, we outlined a tentative classification scheme based on the results of our phylogenetic analysis.
斑腿蝗科是一个广为人知的类群，其成员包括一些最为臭名昭著的农业害虫。该科目前的分类大多基于实用性而非系统发育分析，因此无法为这样一个具有重要经济意义的类群提供所需的稳定性。在本研究中，我们基于形态学首次对该科进行了全面的系统发育分析。通过广泛采集中国动物区系的样本，我们在当前分析中纳入了该科此前公认的每个部落的多个代表。总共，我们研究了94个属，涵盖240个物种，并评估了116个性状，其中包括84个外部形态性状和32个雄性生殖器性状。最终的矩阵由86个内群分类单元和88个性状组成。我们的系统发育分析对该科基部类群的关系有较高分辨率，但对一些冠群分类单元之间的关系显示出相当大的不确定性。我们通过检查性状与所发现的最短树的拟合情况，进一步评估了形态性状在斑腿蝗科系统发育重建中的有用性，与之前的观点相反，我们的结果表明，在推断高级别关系时，生殖器性状不如外部形态信息丰富。我们进一步表明，一般而言，早期的蝗虫分类系统，尤其是斑腿蝗科的分类系统，很可能由于严重依赖生殖器特征而包含许多非自然类群，需要根据未来的系统发育研究进行修订。最后，我们根据系统发育分析结果概述了一个初步的分类方案。
