The rise and diversification of spidroins in the deep-time evolution of spiders

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  The rise and diversification of spidroins in the deep-time evolution of spiders Summary The evolutionary success of spiders is often attributed to their stunning ability to produce and utilize silk, but the potential link between the molecular and phenotypic basis of silk production and spider diversification is seldom tested in a robust dated phylogenetic framework. Here, we provide a macroevolutionary context for testing hypotheses by reconstructing and dating the spider tree of life using genomic and transcriptomic data. We searched exhaustively for members of the spider silk protein (spidroin) gene family from omics data and identified them in an iterative phylogenetic pipeline. Four distinct new types of spidroins with atypical sequence characteristics are discovered to be widespread in true spiders with the potential to affect silk properties, as inferred by our phylogenetic generalized linear mixed model and phylogenetic generalized least squares analyses. Combining our ro...

Record of Lepidoptera and Hemiptera as a food resource of Acutisoma longipes Roewer, 1913 (Arachnida: Opiliones) in the Cerrado, Brazil

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Record of Lepidoptera and Hemiptera as a food resource of Acutisoma longipes Roewer, 1913 (Arachnida: Opiliones) in the Cerrado, Brazil

Abstract 

Harvestmen are nocturnal arachnids, commonly found in humid forests, with omnivorous feeding behavior. There are records of different taxa in the diet of these arthropods, but data is still scarce for many species, especially in Cerrado areas. Thus, the objective of the present work is to report Lepidoptera and Hemiptera in the diet of the harvestman Acutisoma longipes Roewer, 1913 (Arachnida: Opiliones), in Mata de Galeria in the Cerrado of Minas Gerais, Brazil. The records occurred randomly in the municipality of Luminárias, Minas Gerais, on October 10th and December 4th, 2023. In the first record, the species A. longipes was feeding on a moth (Lepidoptera: Erebidae). In the second record, the same species fed on a leafhopper, Mahanarva sp. (Hemiptera: Cercopidae). It was not possible to say whether these insects were preyed upon, usurped by other predators or found dead, but any of these hypotheses can be considered. This record contributes to increasing knowledge about the diet of harvestmen, especially in the Cerrado biome, where there is a need for more related studies.

Silva, Maria Luiza Simões, Igor Rodrigues de Castro, Felipe Barbosa Augusto de Freitas, Diogo Silva Vilela, Gabriel de Castro Jacques, and Marcos Magalhães de Souza. 2024. “Record of Lepidoptera and Hemiptera As a Food Resource of Acutisoma Longipes Roewer, 1913 (Arachnida; Opiliones) in the Cerrado, Brazil”. EntomoBrasilis 17 (June):e1082. https://doi.org/10.12741/ebrasilis.v17.e1082.