As a graduate student, publishing a paper is a big deal. After spending countless hours doing the research, slogging through the writing process, soliciting comments from co-authors, formatting the paper to meet journal guidelines, and dealing with reviewer comments, it’s nice to finally get that acceptance letter and know that your work is getting out there. The ESC Student Affairs Committee is happy to be posting a fourth roundup of papers authored by Canadian graduate students. Stay tuned to the ESC blog for some full length guest posts from some of the students below in the coming weeks!
Have a look at what some entomology grad students in Canada have been up to recently! Articles below were published online from April through June 2015.
Forestry
Seehausen et al. found that parasitism of hemlock looper Lambdina fiscellaria (Guenée) (Lepidoptera: Geometridae) pupae was significantly reduced in plots with high partial cutting intensities (40%). To sustain parasitism rates in forest stands vulnerable to hemlock looper defoliation at naturally high levels, it is recommended to refrain from high intensity partial cutting. Article link
Apechthis ontario parasitizing a hemlock looper pupa (Photo credit: Lukas Seehausen)
During its recent outbreak starting in the early 2000s, the mountain pine beetle destroyed huge areas of lodge pole pine forests in BC and Alberta while also expanding its geographic range east and north. More recently, the beetle has been confirmed to be attacking and reproducing in a novel host, jack pine, which is distributed from Alberta to the Atlantic coast. New research by Taft et al. looks at how specific chemicals in jack pine trees that affect mountain pine beetle vary in jack pine across its range. Article link
Another study from the Erbilgin lab at University of Alberta by Karst et al. revealed that stand mortality caused by prior beetle attacks of mature pines have cascading effects on seedling secondary chemistry, growth and survival, probably mediated through effects on below-ground mutualisms. Article link
Physiology and Genetics
Proshek, Dupuis, et al. found the genetic diversity of Mormon Metalmark species complex are more diverse than traditional morphological characters. Article link
A Lange Metalmark butterfly (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
Oudin, Bonduriansky, and Rundle at the University of Ottawa found the amount of sexual dimorphism present in antler flies is condition-dependent. Article link
Nearby at Carleton University, Webster et al. studied the edge markings on moths to show they can provide camouflage by breaking up their body outline. Article link
Another study from Carleton University, from Hossie et al., showed that predator-deterring eyespots tend to appear on larger-bodied caterpillars and that smaller species are better off remaining undetected. Check out the detailed blog post about this study on the lead author’s blog, and a great photo gallery of caterpillars with eyespots! And here’s the link to the Article.
Jakobs, Gariepy, and Sinclair established that adult phenotypic plasticity is not sufficient to allow Drosophila suzukii to overwinter in temperate habitats. Article link
Insect Management
Part of the PhD work of Angela Gradish focused on the White Mountain arctic butterfly (WMA), a very rare butterfly occurring only on the alpine zone of Mts. Washington and Jefferson in New Hampshire. Despite its threatened status, little was known of the WMA’s population structure, distribution, and behaviour. So Gradish grabbed a net and headed up Mt. Washington, where she spent part of two summers collecting WMA samples for genetic analyses while performing a mark-release-recapture study on the population. She was the first to use genetic analyses to study the WMA, the results of which are presented here. Find the results of the mark-release-recapture study here.
Collecting butterflies on Mount Washington (photo credit: Angela Gradish).
Marshall and Paiero, from the Marshall lab at University of Guelph, gives a new record of a Palaearctic leaf beetle, Cassida viridis, which has been present in Ontario since 1974. Article link
Maguire et al., from the Buddle lab at McGill University, found destructive insect herbivores can positively or negatively impact ecosystem services depending on outbreak conditions. Article link
Biodiversity
Ernst and Buddle discovered that the diversity and assemblage structure of northern carabid beetles show strong latitudinal gradients due to the mediating effects of climate, particularly temperature. Article link
Behaviour and Ecology
The Luong lab at University of Alberta observed that ectoparasitic mites have deleterious effects on host flight performance of Drosophila species. Article link
Therrien et al. from the Erbilgin lab at the University of Alberta found that bacteria can influence brood development of bark beetles in host tissue. Article link
Desai, Kumar, and Currie from the Currie lab at the University of Manitoba conducted the first major baseline study of viruses in Canadian honey bees to show that deformed wing virus has the highest concentration among worker bees. Article link
Baines, McCauley, and Rowe from the Rowe lab at University of Toronto showed that dispersal is a positive function of body condition in backswimmers, but not interactive with predation risk. Article link
Backswimmers can often be seen swimming just under the surface of the water, ventral side up (Photo credit: Shannon McCauley).
Strepsiptera is a peculiar and enigmatic insect order. All are entomophagous endoparasitoids. Unusually for parasitoids, they possess a very broad host range, encompassing 7 orders and 34 families of insects, in various habitats worldwide. Despite their broad host range, and cosmopolitan distribution, surprisingly little is known about their biology. The gaps in knowledge of this group has led to many generalizations about their biology and behaviour. Only recently are studies beginning to uncover a hitherto unforeseen diversity in reproductive strategies. In this review, Kathirithamby, Hrabar, and colleagues discuss the reproductive biology of Strepsiptera: what is known, and what mysteries remain to be solved. Article link
In the Sargent lab at University of Ottawa, Russell-Mercier and Sargent investigated herbivore-mediated differences in floral display traits and found that they impacted pollinator visitation behaviour, but not in female reproductive success. Article link
Techniques
Can you use gut content DNA analysis of a staphilinid beetle to track predation of spotted wing drosophila? Here’s what Renkema et al. found.
Rosati et al., from the Vanlaerhoven lab at University of Windsor, discuss using ImageJ software to quantify blow fly egg deposition in a non-destructive manner. Article link
We are continuing to help publicize graduate student publications to the wider entomological community through our Research Roundup. Find the previous edition here: http://escsecblog.com/2015/05/04/canadian-entomology-research-roundup-march-2015-april-2015/. If you published an article recently and would like it featured, e-mail us at entsoccan.students@gmail.com. You can also send us photos and short descriptions of your research, to appear in a later edition of the research roundup.
For regular updates on new Canadian entomological research, you can join the ESC Students Facebook page or follow us on Twitter @esc_students.
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