scholarly journals The Relationship between Genus/Species Richness and Morphological Diversity among Subfamilies of Jewel Beetles

Insects ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 24
Author(s):  
Yi-Jie Tong ◽  
Hai-Dong Yang ◽  
Josh Jenkins Shaw ◽  
Xing-Ke Yang ◽  
Ming Bai

A positive correlation between the species richness and morphological diversity of some organisms has been found in almost all studies at the local community scale. However, this documented relationship has not always been consistent because of diverse niches and the status of an organism in an ecosystem. Global taxon sampling, new morphological approaches, and consideration of more taxonomic categories other than species level are possible methods to further investigate this contradiction. In this study, we proposed a new paradigm for higher taxa biodiversity analysis based on a cosmopolitan dataset. A total of 1106 species from around the world representing all subfamilies and 33% genera of Buprestidae (jewel beetles) were selected to test the correlation between morphological diversity (MD) and genus/species richness (GR/SR) among subfamilies. The MD was quantified by the contours of the pronotum and elytron in dorsal view based on a geometric morphometric approach. The positive correlation between MD and GR was found in all test combinations, but was irrelevant in the species-level test. Interestingly, the correlation between MD and GR was higher than MD and SR in both pronotum and elytron measurements. Additionally, the MD of the pronotum is obviously higher than the MD of the elytron. Our results demonstrate that the geometric morphometric approach could quite accurately reveal diversity patterns of the family Buprestidae. Future studies on different groups, using more characters, more analyses and detailed biological interpretations, are required to fully understand the relationship between MD and SR.

2012 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-72
Author(s):  
Morteza Karimi-Nia

The status of tafsīr and Qur'anic studies in the Islamic Republic of Iran has changed significantly during recent decades. The essay provides an overview of the state of Qur'anic studies in Iran today, aiming to examine the extent of the impact of studies by Western scholars on Iranian academic circles during the last three decades and the relationship between them. As in most Islamic countries, the major bulk of academic activity in Iran in this field used to be undertaken by the traditional ʿulamāʾ; however, since the beginning of the twentieth century and the establishment of universities and other academic institutions in the Islamic world, there has been increasing diversity and development. After the Islamic Revolution, many gradual changes in the structure and approach of centres of religious learning and universities have occurred. Contemporary advancements in modern sciences and communications technologies have gradually brought the institutions engaged in the study of human sciences to confront the new context. As a result, the traditional Shīʿī centres of learning, which until 50 years ago devoted themselves exclusively to the study of Islamic law and jurisprudence, today pay attention to the teaching of foreign languages, Qur'anic sciences and exegesis, including Western studies about the Qur'an, to a certain extent, and recognise the importance of almost all of the human sciences of the West.


Phytotaxa ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 272 (3) ◽  
pp. 173 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANABELLA AGUILERA ◽  
JIŘĺ KOMÁREK ◽  
RICARDO O. ECHENIQUE

The genus Anabaenopsis comprises about 20 morphospecies distributed in plankton of tropical, subtropical and temperate regions during warm periods. The morphological diversity and population dynamics of Anabaenopsis species from one artificial shallow lake from the Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, was studied during summer 2005 and 2006; and from April 2012 to May 2014. The most common and abundant species were identified as A. elenkinii and A. cf. cunningtonii (first report in Argentina). Anabaenopsis circularis and A. milleri (first report in the American continent and Argentina) were less common, whereas A. nadsonii was rarely observed. Almost all species contributed to algal blooms during warm periods. However, some species were registered even under the lowest temperatures recorded (7.5 °C) and sustained biovolume also during winter (A. milleri, A. elenkinii and A. cf. cunningtonii). These results indicate that some species of the genus are capable of growing at temperatures much lower than 20°C. The species richness noted in this study suggests that there is likely much more diversity remaining on this genus to be reported in Argentina.


2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 517-528 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hao Lei ◽  
Yunhuo Cui ◽  
Wenye Zhou

Most scholars have argued that student engagement positively predicts academic achievement, but some have challenged this view. We sought to resolve this debate by offering conclusive evidence through a meta-analysis of 69 independent studies (196,473 participants). The results revealed that (a) there was a moderately strong and positive correlation between overall student engagement and academic achievement, and an analysis of the domains of behavioral, emotional, and cognitive engagement showed that almost all had a positive correlation with students' academic achievement; and (b) a moderator analysis revealed that the relationship between student engagement and academic achievement was influenced by the method of reporting engagement, cultural value, and gender. Furthermore, the relationships of behavioral, emotional, and cognitive engagement with academic achievement were influenced by reporting method for engagement, cultural value, or gender.


2011 ◽  
Vol 26 (S2) ◽  
pp. 134-134
Author(s):  
A. Agorastos ◽  
S. Randjbar ◽  
C. Muhtz ◽  
L. Jelinek ◽  
M. Kellner ◽  
...  

BackgroundIn the last decades the relationship between religiosity/spirituality (R/S), personal beliefs and mental health has been extensively studied, indicating a significant correlation of these variables. However, the specific relation of R/S to anxiety disorders has been less investigated.ObjectiveThe objective of this prospective study is the investigation of the relation of R/S, magical ideation (MI) and paranormal beliefs (PB) to anxiety disorders in general and OCD in particular, in order to specifically determine a possible impact of these variables on psychopathology scores. In addition, the relation between R/S, PB and MI can be systematically investigated.Design & methodUnselected samples with OCD and other anxiety disorders have been equally assessed within the first week after admission with a face-to-face interview including the following instruments: MINI, HAMD, HAMA and Y-BOCS, OCI-R, STAI, Brief Multidimensional Measure of Religiosity/Spirituality, Magical Ideation Scale and Revised Paranormal Beliefs Scale. Forty healthy participants with no psychiatric history served as controls.ResultsGroups did not differ in any aspect of R/S, MI, or PB. Almost all scales referring to R/S, PB and MI were positively correlated to each other. The results showed a strong positive correlation between high scores of negative religious coping and high psychopathology scores in depression and anxiety. On the other hand, there was a significant positive correlation between MI scores and initial OCD and anxiety scores.ConclusionThis study verifies a significant correlation between personal beliefs and psychopathology in OCD and anxiety disorders. Implications for further research are discussed.


2020 ◽  
pp. 46-52
Author(s):  
Е.В. Яковлева ◽  
Н.В. Исакова

Рассмотрена культурная определенность творческой деятельности в аспекте отношения между творчеством как созданием чего-то принципиально нового и воспроизводством культуры, основанным на экспликации заложенных в нее смыслов. Материалами послужили результаты исследований философов и культурологов, изучавших проблемы социокультурной обусловленности творчества. Проводится аналитическое рассмотрение основных концепций, связанных с трактовкой творчества, изучены подходы к определению творческого статуса отдельных продуктов культуры, затронуты проблемы соотношения содержания и формы в творческой деятельности, охарактеризованы современные условия ее осуществления. Выделены варианты творческой деятельности по критерию характера выражаемых смыслов. Сделан вывод, что в настоящее время присутствуют социальные и технологические предпосылки как для множественной проработки уже известных мейнстримовых направлений, так и для формирования уникальных по форме и содержанию смысловых конструкций. The main problem of the study is to identify the relationship between the individual and culturally predetermined aspects of creative activity with the subsequent extension of the findings to the modern sociocultural situation. The sources were materials and research results of philosophers and culturologists studying the problem of the sociocultural conditioning of creativity. The authors proceed from a methodological premise that implies that, in the creative sphere, there are mechanisms for the “elaboration” of individual ideas, similar in their principles to the development of paradigms in the meaning that Thomas Kuhn attached to this term. The authors ask themselves the question of what the status of creativity is in modern research thought and determine the general points that are characteristic of almost all philosophical systems when considering creativity. The contradictions inherent in the problem of the cultural conditioning of creativity are analyzed. On the one hand, creativity is conditioned by the influence of culture and its development; on the other, it is the product of the free activity of an individual. The authors argue that a simple explication of culture is impossible, but one cannot reject the presence of direct objective factors that, to one degree or another, affect the creative process. Trying to determine the degree of conditionality of the creative process, the authors turn to the analysis of musical notation as a universal language of music. The conclusion is made about the limited (albeit calculated in huge numbers) options for expressing sound combinations. At the same time, this limitation acts simultaneously as determinacy, the so-called “field for maneuver”. Abstracting from this observation, the authors argue that the novelty of creative activity is not absolute: when faced with its product, we observe “the unknown in the known”. It is this aspect that determines the connection between creative individuals when they are forming cultural heritage. Four variants of creative activity are distinguished according to the criterion of the nature of the meanings expressed and the means used for this. The authors argue that the degree of variability of creative activity largely depends on how much society considers it permissible to introduce something new into the existing. They conclude that at present there are social and technological prerequisites both for the multiple elaboration of already known, mainstream areas and for the formation of semantic structures that are unique in their form and content.


Phytotaxa ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 252 (3) ◽  
pp. 185 ◽  
Author(s):  
CINDY FERNÁNDEZ-GARCÍA ◽  
BRIAN WYSOR ◽  
RAFAEL RIOSMENA-RODRÍGUEZ ◽  
ENRIQUE PEÑA-SALAMANCA ◽  
HEROEN VERBRUGGEN

Taxonomy and species richness estimates for the genus Caulerpa have proven challenging due to the difficulty of assessing morphological species limits. In the present study we evaluate the taxonomy of the genus and assess species distributions in the Eastern Tropical Pacific (ETP), based on morphology and tufA sequence data. Molecular analyses revealed  six species-level clades: C. verticillata, C. sertularioides, C. cupressoides, C. serrulata, C. racemosa and C. chemnitzia (part of C. racemosa-peltata complex). Our results reduce species richness estimates throughout the ETP by over 54% (from 13 to 6). In accordance with recent studies, our morphological and DNA results warrant the recognition of C. chemnitzia to comprise the morphological entities C. laetevirens, C. peltata and C. vanbossea complex. We continue the use of ecads as a practical identification tool for morphological diversity below the species level present in the ETP. In addition we formally recognize the synonymy of C. racemosa var. macrophysa with the lineage of C. racemosa proposed in recent studies. The six species of Caulerpa found in this study are of pantropical in distribution. Within the ETP region, four species have restricted distributions (C. verticillata, C. cupressoides, C. serrulata, C. racemosa), while two show a wide latitudinal distribution (C. chemnitzia and C. sertularioides).


1994 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 254 ◽  
Author(s):  
G Fitzhardinge

The growing concerns of the wider community for bio-diversity, ecological maintenance and sustainable long term productivity of Australia's rangelands has focussed attention on land management practices in the semi-arid and arid areas. Where conventional farming paradigms concentrated on farming practices and methods, the paradigms of sustainability rest heavily on changes to farming philosophy for their success. The basic challenges have been well understood for years, and almost all the research has gone into the process of understanding the resource. There is little understanding of the relationship between the ecosystem and either society in general, or the local community. The basic relationship, that between society and the ecosystem, is being overlooked. The social system determines human objectives and the ecosystem presents a range of possibilities through which these objectives are to be realised. Using the work of Ingold, it is argued that technology, ideology and structure are the products of the relationship between society and the ecosystem. The interaction between the ecosystem and the social system then presents a set of possible outcomes that culture atteinpts to solve. There is a need to shift attention from technology and ideology to examining and understanding the relationship between the social system and the ecosystem if the desired changes, such as the maintenance of biodiversity or sustainability, are to be more than superficial.


2015 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michela Lazzeroni ◽  
Andrea Piccaluga

In recent years, universities have become more active in performing new activities that have been added to those regarded as ‘traditional’. This trend has led to a number of changes, among which is a transformation of the status of universities in urban and regional contexts and, in particular, an increase in their impact on the development of medium-sized university cities. From a methodological point of view the contribution of universities to urban development can be analysed from three different perspectives: knowledge and economic; relational; and cultural. Starting from these points of view, this paper analyses three cases of European medium-sized university cities (Oxford, Leuven and Pisa), in which the presence of one or more universities represents an important asset not only for the construction and evolution of knowledge spaces but also for urban development as a whole, by leaving tangible and intangible ‘traces’, reinforcing the relationship between academia and local community and contributing to the identity of knowledge cities.


ZooKeys ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 833 ◽  
pp. 21-40
Author(s):  
Mengna Zhang ◽  
Yongying Ruan ◽  
Xia Wan ◽  
Yijie Tong ◽  
Xingke Yang ◽  
...  

Stag beetles (Coleoptera, Scarabaeoidea, Lucanidae) have received extensive attention from researchers in behavioral ecology and evolutionary biology. There have been no previous quantitative analyses, particularly using a geometric morphometric approach based on a large sample of data, to shed light on the morphological diversity and evolution of Lucanidae. Thoracic adaptation and ecological differentiation are intimately related, and the pronotum bears important muscles and supports the locomotion of prothoracic legs. The elytron is an autapomorphy of the Coleoptera. To reconstruct and visualize the patterns of evolutionary diversification and phylogenetic history of shape change, an ancestral groundplan can be reconstructed by mapping geometric morphometric data onto a phylogenetic tree. In this study, the morphologies of the pronotum and elytron in 1303 stag beetles (Lucanidae), including approximately 99.2% of all globally described species, were examined, thus revealing several aspects of morphological diversity and evolution. First, on the basis of geometric morphometric analysis, we found significant morphological differences in the pronotum or elytron between any two Lucanidae subfamilies. And we subsequently reconstructed the ancestral groundplans of the two structures in stag beetles and compared them with those of extant species (through cladistic and geometric morphometric methods). The ancestral groundplan of Lucanidae was found to be most similar to extant Nicagini in both the pronotum and elytron, according to Mahalanobis distances. Furthermore, we analyzed species richness and morphological diversity of stag beetles and the relationships between them and found that the two parameters were not always correlated. Aesalinae was found to be the most diverse subfamily in both the pronotum and elytron, despite its poor species richness, and the diversity of the pronotum or elytron was not superior in Lucaninae, despite its high species richness. Our study provides insights into the morphological variations and evolutionary history of the pronotum and elytron in four subfamilies of stag beetles, and it illuminates the relationship between morphological diversity and species richness. Intriguingly, our analysis indicates that morphological diversity and species richness are not always correlated. These findings may stimulate further studies in this field.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yijie Tong ◽  
Haidong Yang ◽  
Xingke Yang ◽  
Ming Bai

Abstract Background Species richness (SR) and morphological diversity (MD) provide insights into biodiversity and have been studied extensively as important indicators in recent years. Most researches have been found a positive correlation between SR and MD in many groups, which reflects the influence of phylogenetic factors. However, if some ecological factors are considered, the relationship of SR and MD is not always consistent. In such cases it is interesting to know how phylogenetic factors and ecological factors affect the relations between SR and MD. Unfortunately, studies that examine both factors quantitatively, in the same group with large dataset are lacking. Results In this study, 5148 scarabs covering 92% families and 70% scarabaeoid subfamilies of Scarabaeoidea were selected as a test group. The taxonomic categories of family and subfamily were selected for phylogenetic representation and four feeding types (omnivory, phytophagy, coprophagy and non-feeding) were selected as ecological factors. A geometric morphometric analysis on the pronotum and elytron, which represent the major aspect of the morphology in dorsal view, were conducted. Correlations between MD and SR among sub-/families were always found to be consistent, except a genus-level test of the pronotum on the subfamily category and a species-level test of elytron on the family category. These phenomena reflected a strong phylogenetic influence. However, morphological diversities were not correlated significantly with species richness for any feeding type (ecological factors). In addition to this hypothesis test, the morphological diversity and known world species richness (~ 32000 species and 2453 genera of Scarabaeoidea) were estimated as well. Our global results were very similar to our sampling results. Conclusions Based on our analyses the hypothesis of ecological factor (represented by feeding habit) correlations was rejected in scarabs. On the contrary, phylogenetic factor correlations were found to be statistically significant. The morphological diversity of scarabs in most sub-/families fitted their species richness. At the same time, the correlation our test parameters revealed variation in both groups and characters, which might be caused by morphological changes under coevolution with different ecological factors.


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