Biology subjects

Martins, A. C.

Publications and source records attributed to Martins, A. C..

8 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2025

Sociality and nesting strategy shape the bimodal diversity gradient in bees

Bees are dominant pollinators across native and agricultural plant communities, yet the drivers of their patterns of geographic distribution and functional diversity remain poorly understood. Notably, bees exhibit a bimodal latitudinal diversity gradient, peaking in species diversity in temperate and arid regions rather than the tropics despite their close ecological and evolutionary ties to flowering plants, which show the opposite pattern. Here, we investigated whether two key life history traits thought to shape where bees can live--sociality and nesting strategy--may influence this pattern. We compiled data on sociality and nesting strategy for 4,293 bee species and combined it with a comprehensive phylogeny, curated global occurrence records, and newly-developed models of trait evolution to test 1) whether sociality and nesting biology are evolutionarily correlated, 2) how these life history traits shape bees climatic niches and niche breadths, and 3) whether the evolutionary dynamics of these traits may explain the bimodal latitudinal gradient in bee diversity. We find that the evolution of above-ground nesting is closely tied to the evolution of social behavior, but this trait combination has evolved rarely across the evolutionary history of bees. Where this combination does arise, species that are both social and above-ground nesters tend to have narrower climatic niches and are associated with environments that are warmer, wetter, and experience little seasonal temperature variation, making them more prevalent in tropical bee communities. Together, our results indicate that the bimodal diversity gradient in bees is driven by phylogenetic niche conservatism, where most bee lineages retain ancestral traits suited to arid environments and the derived syndrome necessary for thriving in the tropics evolves rarely.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2025

Stingless Bees of the Amazon Forest: Taxonomic and Geographic Gaps and the Potential for Meliponiculture

Insects, especially those distributed in tropical forests, are greatly impacted by shortfalls in biodiversity knowledge. It is no surprise, then, that there are considerable gaps of knowledge on geographic distribution and taxonomy in the most diverse group of Amazonian bees, stingless bees (tribe Meliponini). Addressing these knowledge gaps is crucial for directing future research efforts and funding effectively, especially given the relevance of meliponiculture in the local economy. Here, we assess the geographic and taxonomic gaps in knowledge for Meliponini in the Amazon basin. We found that there are 27 genera and 239 valid species of native Meliponini in the region, but, among these, 78 species have five or less occurrence points available in open datasets of biodiversity data, while 7 have no available occurrence data. This issue stems from both a lack of collection efforts--especially in areas far from rivers and roads--and insufficient digitization of existing collections. We argue that future research should prioritize resolving taxonomic uncertainties in species complexes that suffer from both geographic and phylogenetic knowledge gaps. Some of these species are also important for meliponiculture, such as Melipona (Michmelia) seminigra and Tetragonisca angustula. Besides, to overcome the large geographical shortfall, both digitization and new collection effort should be employed, including new standardized methods to access the canopy, the largest frontier of biodiversity knowledge in the Amazon.

zoology↗

bioRxiv2023

Contrasting patterns of foraging behavior in Neotropical stingless bees using pollen and honey metabarcoding

Stingless bees are major flower visitors in the tropics, but their foraging preferences and behavior are still poorly understood. Studying stingless bee interactions with angiosperms is methodologically challenging due to the high tropical plant diversity and inaccessibility of upper canopy flowers in forested habitats. Pollen DNA metabarcoding offers an opportunity of assessing floral visitation efficiently and was applied here to understand stingless bee floral resources spectra and foraging behavior. We analyzed pollen and honey of three distantly related species of stingless bees, with different body size and social behavior: Melipona rufiventris, Scaptotrigona postica and Tetragonisca angustula. Simultaneously, we evaluate the local floristic components through seventeen rapid botanical surveys conducted at different distances from the nests. We discovered a broad set of explored floral sources, with 46.3 plant species per bee species in honey samples and 53.67 in pollen samples. Plant families Myrtaceae, Asteraceae, Euphorbiaceae, Melastomataceae and Malpighiaceae dominated the records, indicating stingless bee preferences for abundant resources that flowers of these families provide in the region. Results also reinforce the preference of stingless bees for forest trees, even if only available at long distances. Our high-resolution results encourage future bee-plant studies using pollen and honey metabarcoding in hyper diverse tropical environments.

ecology↗

bioRxiv2021

Evolution of andrenine bees reveals a long and complex history of faunal interchanges between the Americas during the Mesozoic and Cenozoic

Bees are presumed to have arisen in the early to mid-Cretaceous coincident with the fragmentation of the southern continents and concurrently with the early diversification of the flowering plants. Among the main groups of bees, Andreninae sensu lato comprise about 3000 species widely distributed with greatest and disjunct diversity in arid areas of North America, South America, and the Palearctic region. Here, we present the first comprehensive dated phylogeny and historical biogeographic analysis for andrenine bees, including representatives of all currently recognized tribes. Our analyses rely on a dataset of 106 taxa and 7952 aligned nucleotide positions from one mitochondrial and six nuclear loci. Andreninae is strongly supported as a monophyletic group and the recovered phylogeny corroborates the commonly recognized clades for the group. Thus, we propose a revised tribal classification that is congruent with our phylogenetic results. The time-calibrated phylogeny and ancestral range reconstructions of Andreninae reveal a fascinating evolutionary history with Gondwana patterns that are unlike those observed in other subfamilies of bees. Andreninae arose in South America during the Late Cretaceous around 90 Million years ago (Ma) and the origin of tribes occurred through a relatively long time-window from this age to the Miocene. The early evolution of the main lineages took place in South America until the beginning of Paleocene with North American fauna origin from it and Palearctic from North America as results of multiple lineage interchanges between these areas by long-distance dispersal or hopping through landmass chains. Overall, our analyses provide strong evidence of amphitropical distributional pattern currently observed in Andreninae in the American continent as result at least three periods of possible land connections between the two American landmasses, much prior to the Panama Isthmus closure. The andrenine lineages reached the Palearctic region through four dispersal events from North America during the Eocene, late Oligocene and early Miocene, most probably via the Thulean Bridge. The few lineages with Afrotropical distribution likely originated from a Palearctic ancestral in the Miocene around 10 Ma when these regions were contiguous, and the Sahara Desert was mostly vegetated making feasible the passage by several organisms. Incursions of andrenine bees to North America and then onto the Old World are chronological congruent with distinct periods when open-vegetation habitats were available for trans-continental dispersal and at the times when aridification and temperature decline offered favorable circumstances for bee diversification.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2020

Systematics of the oil bee genus Lanthanomelissa and its implications to the biogeography of southern grasslands

Lanthanomelissa is a controversial taxonomic group of bees that was treated as subgenus of Chalepogenus or an independent genus. All of its species are endemic to the south-eastern grasslands of South America, an endangered and still poorly known environment. We aimed to understand the origin of this group of bees in time and space as well as the influence of Quaternary climatic fluctuations on its current distribution and possible link to the history of the Southern Grasslands. We inferred phylogenetic relationships of Lanthanomelissa species using 37 terminals and 3430 nucleotides of three mitochondrial and two nuclear markers and estimated divergence times and ancestral geographic range. We performed an ensemble with the algorithms SVM, Maxent, and Random Forest in a dataset of 192 georeferenced occurrence points using 19 WorldClim bioclimatic variables to analyse species distribution during the current and two past climatic scenarios (LIG, ∼120 kya and LGM, ∼21 kya). The results support the monophyly of the genus and taxonomic changes including the species Lanthanomelissa parva n. comb. on Lanthanomelissa, and the treatment of the goeldianus group of Chalepogenus as the genus Lanthanella. The genus originated at the Oligocene-Miocene border in the Chacoan-Pampean region, and the glacial-interglacial models indicated expansion in Last Glacial Maximum and retraction in Last Interglacial. Expansion and retraction of Lanthanomelissa distribution in the last glacial-interglacial indicated grasslands distributional shifts during periods of climate cooling and warming. The diversification of Lanthanomelissa supported the estimated expansion of southern grasslands in South America concurrently with the origin of Cerrado during the late Miocene. Their origin was approximately synchronized with their exclusive floral host, Sisyrinchium (Iridaceae).View Full Text

zoology↗

bioRxiv2017

Paleocene origin of the Neotropical lineage of cleptoparasitc bees Ericrocidini-Rhathymini (Hymenoptera, Apidae)

Cleptoparasitic bees abandoned the pollen collecting for their offspring and lay their eggs on other bees provisioned nests. Also known as cuckoo bees they belong to several lineages, especially diverse in Apinae. We focused on a lineage of Apinae cleptoparasitic bees, the clade Ericrocidini+Rhathymini, which attack nests of the oil-collecting bees. We sequenced five genes for a broad sampling in this clade plus a large outgroup and reconstruct phylogeny and divergence times. We confirmed the monophyly of the clade Ericrocidini+Rhathymini and its position inside the ericrocidine line, together with the tribes Protepeolini, Isepeolini and Coelioxoidini. Our results corroborate the current taxonomic classification. Ericrocis is the basal most lineage in Ericrocidini and the position of Acanthopus and the most diverse genus Mesoplia were inconclusive. Ericrocidini+Rhathymini diverged from Parepeolus aterrimus 74 mya in the Cretaceous. Considering the robust molecular evidence of their sister relationships, the striking differences on the first instar larvae morphology of the two groups are probably adaptations to the distinct nesting biology of their hosts. As other parasites in the ericrocidine line, both groups possess larvae adapted to kill the immature host and to feed on floral oil provisioned by the host female. The evolution of host specialization in the line Ericrocidini+Rhathymini retroced to the Eocene when they arose synchronously with their hosts, Centris and Epicharis.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2017

From tree tops to the ground: reversals to terrestrial habit in Galeandra orchids (Epidendroideae: Catasetinae)

The colonization of the epiphytic niche of tropical forest canopies played an important role in orchids extraordinary diversification in the Neotropics. However, reversals to the terrestrial habit occurred sparsely in species of Epidendroideae. To better understand which factors might have been involved in reversals to terrestrial habits in the predominantly epiphytic Epidendroideae, we investigate Galeandra diversification in time and space. We hypothesized that the reversal to the terrestrial habitat is linked to the origin of open vegetation habitats in South America. We generated a time-calibrated phylogeny based on a matrix of 17 out of 20 species of Galeandra plus outgroups and seven DNA markers. We found that Galeandra originated towards end of the Miocene, about 10 Ma in Amazonia (including the Guiana Shield). The terrestrial clade originated synchronously with the rise of dry vegetation biomes, suggesting that aridification during the last 5 million years dramatically impacted the diversification of epiphytic lineages in the Neotropics. Habit is correlated with floral spur lengths and geographic range size. The longer spurs and narrower ranges are found in epiphytic species: probably adapted to a specialized pollination mode, associated to the long-tongued Euglossini bees, which also prefer forested habits. The terrestrial species presents variable floral spurs and wide distribution ranges, with evidence of self-pollination, suggesting the loss of specialized pollination system and concomitant range expansion.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2017

Multiple Geographical Origins of Environmental Sex Determination enhanced the diversification of Darwins Favourite Orchids

Environmental sex determination (ESD) - a change in sexual function during an individual life span driven by environmental cues - is an exceedingly rare sexual system among angiosperms. Because ESD can directly affect reproduction success, it could influence diversification rate as compared with lineages that have alternative mating systems. Here we test this hypothesis using a solid phylogenetic framework of Neotropical Catasetinae, the angiosperm lineage richest in taxa with ESD. We assess whether gains of ESD are associated with higher diversification rates compared to lineages with alternative systems while considering additional traits known to positively affect diversification rates in orchids. We found that ESD has evolved asynchronously three times during the last ~5 Myr. Lineages with ESD have consistently higher diversification rates than related lineages with other sexual systems. Habitat fragmentation due to mega-wetlands extinction, and climate instability are suggested as the driving forces for ESD evolution.

evolutionary biology↗