No description available.

The mantis shrimp Gonodactylus oerstedii is known to possess eyes capable of colour and polarised light vision. The apposition compound eyes of these creatures are highly mobile and their ommatidia are specialised to analyse the spectral and e-vector qualities of light in a central strip of the eye called the midband. The retina of the midband of Rows 1-4 is tiered with each row being sensitive to a narrow region of the colour spectrum. Row 5 and 6 ommatidia possess many structural features designed to allow the e-vector direction of light to be detected. This thesis investigates the neuroanatomy in the neuropile regions below the retina in an attempt to elucidate the mechanisms which allow colour and polarised light vision to take place. In Chapter 2 the retina-lamina projection of the retinal axons is studied in an ommatidium in Row 3 of the midband, and the findings suggest that the stomatopod is similar to all other crustacea so far studied, despite its unusual retina. Chapter 3 investigates the neuroanatomy of the medulla neuropile regions. A novel region of the medulla externa which deals with colour information is discovered. In Chapter 4 the lamina of Rows 1-4 is looked at in more detail, with the number of monopolar cells and the detailed arrangements of the retinular cell terminals being ascertained. The terminals sensitive to different regions of the spectrum are located in different areas of the lamina cartridge. Chapter 5 looks at many of the issues above but this time in relation to rows 5 and 6 of the midband, which are specialised for polarisation vision. The lamina neuropile is very different to that of Rows 1-4 and again a specialised region of the medulla externa is found which processes information from these rows. This thesis provides evidence that the optic lobes of Gonodactylus oerstedii are comparable to other crustacea but nevertheless may possess some intriguing specialisations related to their extraordinary colour and polarised light vision.

The study of aposematic coloration and mimicry has a long and distinguished history, and has stimulated scientific inquiry in areas as diverse as chemistry, evolution, ecology, and behavior. Yet, many questions regarding signal function and ecological dynamics remain unknown. This dissertation attempts to address some of these questions about how a visual warning signal functions and how the environment changes its efficacy. First, I evaluated the role of luminance contrast in aposematic signaling using milkweed bugs as model prey and Chinese mantids as model predators. Predators learned to avoid unpalatable prey sooner and remembered to avoid unpalatable prey for longer when the prey had higher luminance contrast with the background. These results help define what makes a visual signal conspicuous and designate the importance of high luminance contrast in the efficacy of a warning color signal. Another important characteristic of warning coloration is the reason for the advertisement. I was able to identify and quantify the toxic compounds in both the host plant and the viceroy butterfly, a putative aposematic insect. These results provide a chemical mechanism for previous research that demonstrated that the viceroy was unpalatable to avian predators. Next, I was able to test the role of geographic variation in host plant and viceroy chemical defense and how that variation compared with the local abundance of a mimicry co-model of the viceroy, the queen butterfly. The results indicated the viceroy was more chemically defended and more unpalatable in locations where the queen was at low abundances. This result suggests that mimicry evolves in a geographic mosaic of co-evolution. Finally, I used molecular phylogenetic approaches to reconstruct and test the evolution of mimicry in the North American admiral butterflies (Limenitis: Nymphalidae). One species, L. arthemis, evolved the black, pipevine swallowtail mimetic form but later reverted to the white-banded ancestral form. This character reversion is strongly correlated with the geographic absence of the model species and its host plant, not the mimics host plant distribution. These results support the idea that loss of model in a geographic area is not an evolutionary stopping point for a Batesian mimic.

No description available.

The relatively small insect order Mantodea (praying mantises) is comprised of approximately 2,366 described species distributed in 436 genera. Members of the group occupy diverse habitats and are distributed across the globe, though their greatest numbers and diversity are concentrated primarily in the tropics. Though continental endemism is common, many groups have a broad global distribution. An immense diversity of morphology is exhibited across the order with adult mantises ranging in size from 2cm to ~25cm, and appearing like a dead leaf, a piece of quartz rock, or a blade of grass. The diversification and specialization of mantises in ecologically diverse and biogeographically dispersed habitats suggest interesting questions about their morphological and behavioral adaptations. Despite their considerable popularity and consistent presence in the history of humanity, praying mantises have received surprising little attention from a phylogenetic or evolutionary standpoint. Though taxonomic studies have been thorough, discrepancies among classifications suggest wide latitude in the interpretation of morphological characters and their relative importance for grouping taxa. To address the lack of evolutionary knowledge surrounding praying mantises, the specific goals of this project were to: a) Reconstruct a comprehensive phylogeny for Mantodea using molecular characters; b) Use the phylogeny to elucidate character system evolution including hunting strategy, auditory evolution, and morphological convergences; and c) Investigate biogeographic patterns and determine the origins of the modern Mantodea. A comprehensive taxonomic and distributional sampling of Mantodea, covering virtually all higher-level groups, was assembled to reconstruct the phylogeny for the order. Sequence data were generated from five mitochondrial and four nuclear loci for 331 mantis species along with ten cockroach and termite species as outgroups. The resulting phylogenetic hypotheses served as the first glimpse of mantis evolutionary relationships and provided a template for further investigation. Only 7 of 15 families, 16 of 48 subfamilies, and 11 of 46 tribes were recovered as monophyletic indicating that phylogeny is largely incongruent with current mantis classification. As is the case in many other orders of insects, 'key characters' that do not reflect phylogeny are largely responsible for delimiting the groups. An investigation of mantis hunting strategy revealed clear transitions from generalist hunting mantises to the more derived strategies of cursorial and ambush hunting. In fact, the ambush hunting strategy appears to have evolved once, which led to a major diversification within the order. Some praying mantises have sensitive ultrasonic hearing arising from a unique 'cyclopean' ear located in the ventral metathorax. This project explored the evolutionary history of the mantis auditory system by integrating large anatomical, neurophysiological, behavioral, and molecular databases. Using an 'auditory phylogeny' based on 13 morphological characters, a primitively earless form of metathoracic anatomy was indentified in several extant taxa. In addition, there are five distinct mantis auditory systems. Three of these can be identified anatomically, and the other two can only be detected neurophysiologically. Mapping these results onto a phylogenetic tree derived from molecular data, shows that the cyclopean mantis ear evolved once 85-90 mya. All the other auditory system types are either varying degrees of secondary loss, or are recent innovations that each occurred independently multiple times. The neurophysiological response to ultrasound is remarkably consistent across all taxa tested, as is the multi-component, in-flight behavior triggered by ultrasound. Thus, mantises have an ancient, highly conserved auditory neural-behavioral system that probably arose for evasion of echolocating predators. Modern bat families diverged ca. 63 mya, but the echolocating ancestors of bats appeared earlier. Alternatively, non-bat predators may have driven the evolution of the unique mantis auditory systems. Mapping biogeographic regions on the phylogeny demonstrated that our results adhere closer to geographic distribution than to the current classification. Specific patterns in distribution suggest that major morphological convergences have confounded taxonomists ability to construct natural groups. It was found that major mantis lineages diverged prior to the isolation of geographic regions and subsequent ecomorphic specializations within these regions led to convergences in morphology. Divergence time estimations place the origins of Mantodea at the beginning of the Jurassic with modern mantises originating on Gondwanaland in the Early Cretaceous. The first major divergence among modern mantises occurred as a result of the splitting of South America from Africa. The subsequent breakup of Gondwanaland continents spurred numerous divergences within the order and led to the contemporary paraphyletic assemblages of taxa within each biogeographic region. In fact, most divergences between Afrotropical and Indomalayan lineages resulted from the slow dissociation between Africa and the Indian subcontinent. Our results also suggest that Antarctica played an important role as a biological conduit during the diversification of some Afrotropical and Indomalayan lineages. Further, Antarctica facilitated the repeated invasions of South America and Australia prior to the separation of these two continents from Antarctica during the Eocene. When India slammed into Asia around 50 million years ago, it released a flood of mantises into Asia and Southeast Asia that diversified and currently comprise the largest component of Indomalayan taxa. The origins, secondary invasions, and regional extinctions have created an order of insects with complex distributional and evolutionary histories.

Mantodea é uma ordem composta por insetos popularmente conhecidos como louva-a-deus, incluindo aproximadamente 2300 espécies com distribuição principalmente pantropical. Trabalhos recentes trouxeram indícios de que a classificação atual não reflete a história evolutiva da ordem, sendo necessário realizar mais estudos para resolver esse problema. O gênero Stagmatoptera foi criado por Burmeister em 1838 para abrigar as espécies de Mantodea conhecidas por ele que possuíam uma mancha no estigma da tégmina. Com as descrições de novas espécies e o trabalho de outros pesquisadores, a composição do gênero se alterou, e até o início deste trabalho ele incluía 15 espécies. Stagmatoptera foi revisto, tendo como base material depositado em coleções científicas, visando determinar quais espécies eram válidas e se havia espécies não descritas. Também foi investigada a utilidade das genitálias masculina e feminina para estudos taxonômicos. Após o estudo, o número de espécies dentro do gênero é reduzido para 14, com as seguintes alterações: restabelecimento da sinonímia entre Stagmatoptera supplicaria e S. flavipennis, sinonímia entre S. pia e S. nova, sinonímia entre S. femoralis e S. ignota, e a descrição de duas novas espécies. As genitálias se mostraram úteis na distinção entre as espécies, sendo uma fonte de caracteres morfológicos importantes para taxonomia, e possivelmente para estudos filogenéticos. / Mantodea is an order composed by insects popularly known as praying mantises, including about 2300 species with, mainly, a pantropical distribution. Recent works brought to light the possibility that the current classification does not reflect the evolutionary history of the order, thus being necessary more research to solve this problem. The genus Stagmatoptera was created by Burmeister in 1838 to include the Mantodea species he knew, that had a spot on the tegmina. With the description of new species and the work of other scientists the genus composition changed, and at the beginning of this work Stagmatoptera included 15 species. Stagmatoptera was revised using the material deposited in scientific collections, to determine which species were valid and if there were undescribed species. The utility of the male and female genitalia to taxonomic studies was also investigated. After the study, the number of species in the genus is reduced to 14 with the following changes: reestablishment of the synonym between Stagmatoptera supplicaria and S. flavipennis, synonymization between S. pia and S. nova, synonymization between S. femoralis and S. ignota, and the description of two new species. The genitalia proved to be useful in the distinction among the species, being an important source of morphological characters to taxonomic studies and, possibly, phylogenetic studies.

Mantodea é uma ordem composta por insetos popularmente conhecidos como louva-a-deus, incluindo aproximadamente 2300 espécies com distribuição principalmente pantropical. Trabalhos recentes trouxeram indícios de que a classificação atual não reflete a história evolutiva da ordem, sendo necessário realizar mais estudos para resolver esse problema. O gênero Stagmatoptera foi criado por Burmeister em 1838 para abrigar as espécies de Mantodea conhecidas por ele que possuíam uma mancha no estigma da tégmina. Com as descrições de novas espécies e o trabalho de outros pesquisadores, a composição do gênero se alterou, e até o início deste trabalho ele incluía 15 espécies. Stagmatoptera foi revisto, tendo como base material depositado em coleções científicas, visando determinar quais espécies eram válidas e se havia espécies não descritas. Também foi investigada a utilidade das genitálias masculina e feminina para estudos taxonômicos. Após o estudo, o número de espécies dentro do gênero é reduzido para 14, com as seguintes alterações: restabelecimento da sinonímia entre Stagmatoptera supplicaria e S. flavipennis, sinonímia entre S. pia e S. nova, sinonímia entre S. femoralis e S. ignota, e a descrição de duas novas espécies. As genitálias se mostraram úteis na distinção entre as espécies, sendo uma fonte de caracteres morfológicos importantes para taxonomia, e possivelmente para estudos filogenéticos. / Mantodea is an order composed by insects popularly known as praying mantises, including about 2300 species with, mainly, a pantropical distribution. Recent works brought to light the possibility that the current classification does not reflect the evolutionary history of the order, thus being necessary more research to solve this problem. The genus Stagmatoptera was created by Burmeister in 1838 to include the Mantodea species he knew, that had a spot on the tegmina. With the description of new species and the work of other scientists the genus composition changed, and at the beginning of this work Stagmatoptera included 15 species. Stagmatoptera was revised using the material deposited in scientific collections, to determine which species were valid and if there were undescribed species. The utility of the male and female genitalia to taxonomic studies was also investigated. After the study, the number of species in the genus is reduced to 14 with the following changes: reestablishment of the synonym between Stagmatoptera supplicaria and S. flavipennis, synonymization between S. pia and S. nova, synonymization between S. femoralis and S. ignota, and the description of two new species. The genitalia proved to be useful in the distinction among the species, being an important source of morphological characters to taxonomic studies and, possibly, phylogenetic studies.

A physical model was built to study the properties of the feeding strike of the mantis shrimp that are responsible for drag reduction and cavitation control. The model had three goals: 1) The model was to be outfitted with a method to collect kinematic, force and cavitation data. 2) The velocity and acceleration profile of the model were to be predicted with a mathematical model of the mechanism. 3) The model was to match as many drag and cavitation sensitive properties of the mantis shrimp strike as feasible and have a means to control the rest. The first iteration of the model met the first goal but not the second or third. It matched the strike in maximum velocity, appendage size and shape and environmental temperature and salinity but did not control acceleration profile, water quality or pressure. Data collected with high-speed video of strikes of the model and Gonodactylus smithii showed the model to cavitate at speeds at which no cavitation was seen in animal strikes. The model was redesigned to be driven by the stored elastic energy in the deflection of a beam spring. The redesigned model reached the animals maximum accelerations but not velocities. Environmental variation was found to not substantially contribute to the variation in cavitation onset velocity between the model and animal experiments.

The praying mantis (Mantis religiosa) is the only representative of the order Mantodea in central Europe. Within Czech Republic, this species is distributed mostly on xerothermic localities in southern Moravia. However, M. religiosa has been spreading more to the north not only in Czech Republic, but also in other Europian countries recently. The aim of this study was to reconstruct phylogeography based on genetic markers. It seems that studied species was distributed at least in three lineages in Europe, which could be connected with glacial refugias. First lineage was spread to the north probably from Pyrenean peninsula, second lineage from Crimea peninsula and third lineage from Balkan area. Nine microsatellite loci were tested and will be used for consequent sctudy of phylogeography and distribution of M. religiosa within Europe. Keywords: Mantis religiosa, mtDNA, microsatellite, expansion, phylogeography, phylogeny.

Submitted by Fabio Sobreira Campos da Costa (fabio.sobreira@ufpe.br) on 2016-03-15T13:44:42Z No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 1232 bytes, checksum: 66e71c371cc565284e70f40736c94386 (MD5) DISSERTACAO_MESTRADO_ALVARO_MAGNUM_2015.pdf: 2738529 bytes, checksum: 1954d6163f8ba9074e68546e0f003f12 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-03-15T13:44:42Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 1232 bytes, checksum: 66e71c371cc565284e70f40736c94386 (MD5) DISSERTACAO_MESTRADO_ALVARO_MAGNUM_2015.pdf: 2738529 bytes, checksum: 1954d6163f8ba9074e68546e0f003f12 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-05-22 / Criado por Dan North, o BDD (Behavior Driven Development) é uma técnica de desenvolvimento ágil de software baseada no TDD (Test Driven Development) e que foca no teste de software orientado por comportamentos, isto é, concentra-se nas razões pelo qual o software é criado e nos requisitos de comportamento do negócio. A utilização da técnica traz uma série de benefícios para projetos de desenvolvimento de software, contudo, ela não tem uma aceitação tão grande no mercado e é, muitas vezes, preterida em relação ao TDD. Esse trabalho faz uma análise dessa situação e também propõe um ambiente que visa facilitar a adoção do BDD através da análise dos seguintes questionamentos: quais características devem fazer parte de uma ferramenta para que ela facilite e dinamize a utilização do BDD no contexto de um projeto de desenvolvimento de software? Como permitir o uso da mesma por um cliente leigo em testes, e, ao mesmo tempo, agregar valor para o gerente do projeto, os testadores e os desenvolvedores de software? Como o cliente poderia acompanhar em tempo real se o que ele espera obter está, de fato, sendo construído? Como medir o impacto da ferramenta? Através de análises e resultados obtidos em mais de 12 anos de experiência profissional no setor de tecnologia de instituições públicas e privadas, além de pesquisas na literatura, entrevistas com profissionais de TI e avaliações de ferramentas BDD no mercado, foi concebido um plugin: o BDD Plugin for Mantis (BDDPM), uma ferramenta cujo objetivo é facilitar a adoção do BDD em projetos de desenvolvimento de software. Para avaliar o plugin quanto ao cumprimento dos objetivos, foi utilizada uma técnica denominada GQM (Goal/Question/Metric), que permite, através de objetivos bem estabelecidos, planejar e mensurar métricas de avaliação. O BDDPM foi avaliado com sucesso dentro de um ambiente de produção real, uma autarquia do Governo do Estado da Paraíba: a Paraíba Previdência. Este trabalho descreve, em detalhes, todo o ciclo de vida do projeto, desde sua concepção, passando por sua criação, tecnologias utilizadas, recursos incluídos, etc. / Created by Dan North, BDD (Behavior Driven Development) is a software agile development technique based on TDD (Test Driven Development). The BDD focuses on software testing oriented by behaviors, that is, it focuses on the reasons why a software is created and its business behavior. The use of the technique brings a number of benefits for software development projects; however, BDD does not have such a great market as the TDD: the first choice of the majority. This work brings an analysis of this situation and also proposes an environment to facilitate the adoption of BDD by examining the following questions: what characteristics should be part of a tool so that it facilitate and streamline the use of BDD in a context of project software development? How can it be used by an unexperienced client, and, at the same time, add value to project managers, testers and developers? How the customer could follow, in real time, if what he expects to, is really being built? How to measure the impact of the tool? Through analysis and results obtained from over 12 years of professional experience in the technology sector of public and private institutions, as well as research in the literature, interviews with IT professionals and reviews of BDD tools on the market, a plugin was developed: the BDD Plugin for Mantis (BDDPM), a tool which aims to facilitate the adoption of BDD in software development projects. To assess the plugin in meeting the goals, a technique called GQM (Goal / Question / Metric) was used; it allows, through well-established objectives, plan and measure evaluation metrics. The BDDPM was successfully evaluated in a real production environment, a company called Paraíba Previdência. This paper describes in detail the entire life cycle of the project: from its conception, through its creation, the technologies used, features included, etc.