Undergraduate student discovers 18 new species of aquatic beetle in
South America

Date:
June 22, 2020
Source:
University of Kansas
Summary:
An undergraduate student has just published a description of 18
new species of aquatic water beetle from the genus Chasmogenus.



FULL STORY ==========================================================================
It would be striking for a seasoned entomologist with decades of fieldwork
to discover such a large number of species unknown to science. But for University of Kansas student Rachel Smith, an undergraduate majoring in
ecology & evolutionary biology, the find is extraordinary: Smith recently published a description of 18 new species of aquatic water beetle from
the genus Chasmogenus in the peer-reviewed journal ZooKeys.


==========================================================================
"The average size of these beetles, I would say, is about the size
of a capital 'O' in a 12-point font," said Smith of the collection
of new species. "They spend a lot of their life in forest streams
and pools. They're aquatic, so they're all great swimmers -- and they
can fly." The research involved Smith traveling to Suriname to perform fieldwork as well as passing countless hours in the lab of Andrew Short, associate professor of ecology & evolutionary biology and associate
curator with KU's Biodiversity Institute, who co-wrote the new paper.

Smith said many of the aquatic beetle species are virtually
indistinguishable simply by looking at them, even under a microscope.

"Something unique and fascinating about this genus, particularly the ones
I worked on, is that many look almost exactly the same," she said. "Even
to my trained eye, it's hard to tell them apart just based on external morphology.

Their uniqueness is in there but kind of hidden in this very uniform
external morphology." To identify the new species, Smith compared DNA
evidence from the aquatic beetles with a few external morphological
differences that could be observed.

But this was not enough: Much of Smith's work also hinged on dissecting
these tiny specimens collected in northeastern South America to spot
key differences in their internal anatomy.



========================================================================== "Because it's difficult to tell them apart from external morphology,
you kind of have to go inside," she said. "I ended up doing over 100 dissections of these beetles to extract the male genitalia and look at
it under a microscope.

That really was the true way to tell them apart. Ultimately, it came
down to male genitalia and genetic divergence that I used to delimit many
of these species." The aquatic beetles described in the new paper were collected over multiple trips to Venezuela, Suriname and Guyana. Smith
herself participated in one expedition to Suriname to collect specimens.

"In Suriname, almost every day involved a boat ride down a river or
kayaking to a location," she said. "And there would have been either a
short or a long hike. One day it was up an entire mountain, another day
it was just a short little hike down a river trail. Well, not necessarily
a trail because there aren't trails in the rainforest. We'd find an area
that had some small, slow- moving or stagnant pools. The best ones are
usually still and have dead leaves and mud and detritus -- that's where
a lot of these beetles are found. You definitely have to get dirty to do
this work, but it's very satisfying." Indeed, one of the beetles Smith
and her fellow researchers discovered in the Suriname rainforest ended
up being unknown to science.

"I was part of a group that collected one of the beetles that was named
in this paper," she said. "So, I was involved in the entire process of
naming a species -- going to the rainforest, collecting it, bring it back
to the lab, naming it and describing it. It was so nice to be a part of
the whole process of discovering a new species." Smith's co-author and
faculty mentor Short said her paper reflects two years of work and is a remarkable accomplishment for any scientist, much less an undergraduate student.



========================================================================== "While new species for me are common, this is quite a lot for one paper
and a huge amount for a student to describe," he said. "Rachel has done
a great job.

An undergraduate describing 18 species is extraordinary -- it's rare
even for experienced scientists. I've described a lot of new species
but never as many as 18 at once. This work highlights just how little
we know about how many species there are in South America." Smith said
after graduation from KU in December, her aim is to develop a career in fieldwork and research, to uncover hidden biodiversity in hopes that it
can empower conservation efforts in threatened areas.

"I've always had my sights set on a larger picture, and conservation
really is my ultimate goal," she said. "You have to start from the
bottom up, with taxonomy. You can't really know the efficacy of any
kind of conservation effort without knowing what you're protecting or
any idea of how many species are there. As I described in this paper,
over half of these species are microendemic, meaning that they only occur
in one specific locality. So, it begs the question -- is there something
unique in that area that these beetles are specializing on, and what kind
of kind of niches or roles do they play in that ecosystem? Hopefully
it leads to a larger conversation about taking action to get certain
areas protected." Smith said destruction of such habitats could lead
to an incalculable loss of biodiversity, but taxonomists could inform
debates that pit species conservation against economic gains that come
from extraction of natural resources.

"There's deforestation and logging and a lot of gold mining in this
particular area where I was at in Suriname," she said. "But I think the take-home message from this paper really is that biodiversity is found
in even in the smallest puddles in South America."

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_Kansas. Note: Content
may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Rachel R. Smith, Andrew Edward Z. Short. Review of the genus
Chasmogenus
Sharp, 1882 of northeastern South America with an emphasis on
Venezuela, Suriname, and Guyana (Coleoptera, Hydrophilidae,
Acidocerinae). ZooKeys, 2020; 934: 25 DOI: 10.3897/zookeys.934.49359 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/06/200622133024.htm

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