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(Reference retrieved automatically from Web of Science through information on FAPESP grant and its corresponding number as mentioned in the publication by the authors.)

Comparative study of the morphology of the gland opening area among Grassatores harvestmen (Arachnida, Opiliones, Laniatores)

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Author(s):
Gnaspini, Pedro [1] ; Rodrigues, Gisele C. S. [1]
Total Authors: 2
Affiliation:
[1] Univ Sao Paulo, Inst Biociencias, Dept Zool, Sao Paulo - Brazil
Total Affiliations: 1
Document type: Journal article
Source: JOURNAL OF ZOOLOGICAL SYSTEMATICS AND EVOLUTIONARY RESEARCH; v. 49, n. 4, p. 273-284, NOV 2011.
Web of Science Citations: 12
Abstract

Arachnids of the order Opiliones (harvestmen), which includes around 6000 species, have a pair of scent glands that open at the sides of the body, producing substances used as defence. Several types of behavioural, morphological and chemical defensive mechanisms have been identified in the order as a whole, although some of these tactics were restricted to particular groups. Only around 60 species have been studied from this perspective so far, more than half of which belong to the largest harvestman family within the order Laniatores, the Gonyleptidae, and have only recently been studied in an evolutionary perspective, showing the usefulness of defensive characters in taxonomy and evolutionary biology. Within Laniatores, the Grassatores clade includes the Gonyleptidae and 20 additional families, mostly poorly or not previously studied. We describe the morphology of the structures involved in fluid displacement during chemical defence in 15 of these families (data on two additional families are available from the literature) and discuss the evolution of such traits based on an available phylogenetic hypothesis of relationships within Grassatores, using the representatives of Triaenonychidae (a non-Grassatores family of Laniatores) for comparison. We conclude that most non-gonyleptoid Grassatores share (maybe plesiomorphically) a series of characteristics, mostly strongly different from what is observed within the gonyleptoids, and that smaller groups seem to share diagnostic features related to chemical defence, as is the case of stygnids, cosmetids and triaenonychines, and especially of manaosbiids and cranaids, whose defensive morphologies largely resemble those of derived gonyleptids. The following main synapomorphies were detected: (a) Grassatores: the presence of a deep and well-defined descending channel; (b) Samooidea + Zalmoxoidea + Assamioidea + Gonyleptoidea: lateral pegs along the lateral channel; (c) Samooidea + Zalmoxoidea: deep channels forming an H on the dorsal scute; (d) Gonyleptoidea: ozopore cutting dorsally (reversing in Agoristenidae and Stygnidae to a laterally placed oval ozopore), a wide and smooth lateral channel, reversing to a lateral channel whose bottom is covered with either small plates (Agoristenidae) or high tubercles (Stygnidae), and apophyses of coxa II close to or covering the ozopore. (AU)

FAPESP's process: 00/04686-4 - Comparative biology of insects and arachnids, with emphasis on groups including cave specimens
Grantee:Pedro Gnaspini Netto
Support Opportunities: Research Projects - Thematic Grants