Monday, December 10, 2007
D0002

Phylogeny of the North American Asidini (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae) based on morphology

Aaron D. Smith, smit1024@msu.edu and Anthony, I. Cognato, cognato@msu.edu. Michigan State University, Department of Entomology, 243 Natural Science, East Lansing, MI

The tribe Asidini (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae) contains a diverse group of flightless beetles found in many arid and semi-arid habitats around the world. In North America there are approximately 280 described species in 27 genera ranging from Oaxaca, Mexico to Alberta, Canada. Many of the NA asidine genera were last revised nearly one hundred years ago based on a limited number of specimens. Eighty species of North American Asidini were scored for 140 morphological characters to provide a phylogenetic framework for the tribe, determine monophyletic groups, and compare them to the current asidine genera. While resolution was generally low, some branches were well supported and indicate that many of the current genera are not monophyletic.


Species 1: Coleoptera Tenebrionidae (darkling beetles)