| Title: | Rhynchophorus palmarum in Disguise: Undescribed Polymorphism in the 'Black' Palm Weevil |
| Author(s): | Lohr B; Vasquez-Ordonez AA; Becerra Lopez-Lavalle LA; |
| Address: | "Corporacion Colombiana de Investigacion Agropecuaria, Centro de Investigacion Palmira, Palmira, Valle del Cauca, Colombia. Entomology Program, Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical, AA 6713, Cali, Valle del Cauca, Colombia. Cassava Program, Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical, AA 6713, Cali, Valle del Cauca, Colombia" |
| DOI: | 10.1371/journal.pone.0143210 |
| ISSN/ISBN: | 1932-6203 (Electronic) 1932-6203 (Linking) |
| Abstract: | "During studies to adapt pheromone trapping of Rhynchophorus palmarum to the special coconut growing conditions at the Colombian Pacific coast, 152 atypically-colored specimens were captured in a total collection of 53,802 of the normally completely black weevil. Five specimens had the typical coloration of Rhynchophorus ferrugineus, an invasive species recently introduced to Aruba and Curacao. A regional expansion of this invasion to the South American continent was feared and all atypical specimens were submitted to taxonomic analysis. Both conventional and molecular methods were employed. Conventional taxonomics confirmed the samples as belonging to R. palmarum but registered undescribed and species-atypical morphological variability in the subgular suture (wide vs. narrow), the ratio between intraocular distance and width of antennal scrobes (>0.35 vs. < 0.29) and the indentation of the mandibles (up to three mandibular teeth vs. bilobed). Molecular analysis placed all samples inspected, black and reddish alike, firmly within the R. palmarum group and the hypothesis of having inter-specific hybrids was rejected using co-dominant single sequence repeat markers with allelic specificity for both species" |
| Keywords: | "Animals Arthropod Antennae/anatomy & histology Eye/anatomy & histology Female Genome, Insect Introduced Species Male Phylogeny *Polymorphism, Genetic Sequence Analysis, DNA/methods Weevils/*anatomy & histology/*classification/genetics;" |
| Notes: | "MedlineLohr, Bernhard Vasquez-Ordonez, Aymer Andres Becerra Lopez-Lavalle, Luis Augusto eng Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't 2015/12/20 PLoS One. 2015 Dec 18; 10(12):e0143210. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0143210. eCollection 2015" |
