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Carnoidea Genera
Carnoidea is a superfamily of Acalyptratae flies. Description In general, carnoids are small flies no more than a few millimetres long. Carnoidea is a poorly defined superfamily. In 1989, ten synapomorphies were described for the group, but most of these have later been challenged. As of 2006, the following synapopmorphies were described: uppermost fronto-orbital bristle(s) of the head is exclinate; phallus of the male is flexible, unsclerotized, simple and elongate; and phallus is microtrichose. Ecology Braulidae are associated with honey bees, with larvae developing in beeswax while adults attach to bees and feed from bee mouthparts. Canacidae adults are mainly found on seashore habitats such as beaches, estuarine tidal flats, wave-swept rocks and mangroves. Little is known about their larvae, but they are believed to mainly feed on algae in the intertidal zone. Australimyzidae are also found on seashores, being associated with dead or decaying plant matter. Carnidae are ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tethina Lusitanica
''Tethina'' is a genus of beach flies in the family Canacidae (formally Tethinidae). They are found in all terrestrial biogeographic realms. Biology Like most Tethininae, ''Tethina'' species mostly live in salty environments. They are found on coastal marine habitats including the intertidal zones and on wrack heaps, as well as salt marshes, coastal dune vegetation, and on salty soils or bare sand. Some species of ''Tethina'' are also found at desert oases. Species *'' T. acrostichalis'' Freidberg and Beschovski, 1996 *'' T. albitarsa'' Foster and Mathis, 1998 *'' T. alboguttata'' (Strobl, 1900) *'' T. albosetulosa'' (Strobl, 1900) *'' T. albula'' ( Loew, 1869) *'' T. amphitrite'' Munari and Báez, 2000 *'' T. angustifrons'' Melander, 1952 *'' T. angustipennis'' ( Melander, 1952) *'' T. callosirostris'' Munari, 2008 *'' T. cohiba'' Foster and Mathis, 1998 *'' T. czernyi'' (Hendel, 1934) *'' T. dunae'' Munari, 2007 *'' T. flavigenis'' (Hendel, 1934) *'' T. flavoidea'' Beschovski, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Estuary
An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime environments and are an example of an ecotone. Estuaries are subject both to marine influences such as tides, waves, and the influx of saline water, and to fluvial influences such as flows of freshwater and sediment. The mixing of seawater and freshwater provides high levels of nutrients both in the water column and in sediment, making estuaries among the most productive natural habitats in the world. Most existing estuaries formed during the Holocene epoch with the flooding of river-eroded or glacially scoured valleys when the sea level began to rise about 10,000–12,000 years ago. Estuaries are typically classified according to their geomorphological features or to water-circulation patterns. They can have many different names, such as bays, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ephydroidea
The Ephydroidea are a superfamily of muscomorph flies, with over 6,000 species. Description A characteristic of adult Ephydroidea (shared with their relatives such as Calyptratae) is that the pedicel of the antenna has a dorsoventral seam or incision. Ecology Ephydroidea live in many habitats and have diverse diets. For example, most Ephydridae have larvae that are aquatic/semi-aquatic and feed as browsers or filter-feeders, but there are also species with terrestrial larvae that are egg predators, egg parasitoids, leaf miners or saprophages. Most Drosophilidae breed in rotting material where they feed on yeast and bacteria, but there are also species that attack whole fruits. Phylogeny A 2021 analysis found Ephydroidea to be the sister taxon In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Drosophilidae
The Drosophilidae are a diverse, cosmopolitan family of flies, which includes species called fruit flies, although they are more accurately referred to as vinegar or pomace flies. Another distantly related family of flies, Tephritidae, are true fruit flies because they are frugivorous, and include apple maggot flies and many pests. The best known species of the Drosophilidae is ''Drosophila melanogaster'', within the genus ''Drosophila'', also called the "fruit fly." ''Drosophila melanogaster'' is used extensively for studies concerning genetics, development, physiology, ecology and behaviour. Many fundamental biological mechanisms were discovered first in ''D. melanogaster.'' The fruit fly is mostly composed of post-mitotic cells, has a very short lifespan, and shows gradual aging. As in other species, temperature influences the life history of the animal. Several genes have been identified that can be manipulated to extend the lifespan of these insects. Additionally, ''Drosophi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monophyly
In cladistics for a group of organisms, monophyly is the condition of being a clade—that is, a group of taxa composed only of a common ancestor (or more precisely an ancestral population) and all of its lineal descendants. Monophyletic groups are typically characterised by shared derived characteristics ( synapomorphies), which distinguish organisms in the clade from other organisms. An equivalent term is holophyly. The word "mono-phyly" means "one-tribe" in Greek. Monophyly is contrasted with paraphyly and polyphyly as shown in the second diagram. A ''paraphyletic group'' consists of all of the descendants of a common ancestor minus one or more monophyletic groups. A '' polyphyletic group'' is characterized by convergent features or habits of scientific interest (for example, night-active primates, fruit trees, aquatic insects). The features by which a polyphyletic group is differentiated from others are not inherited from a common ancestor. These definitions have taken ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sister Group
In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram: Taxon A and taxon B are sister groups to each other. Taxa A and B, together with any other extant or extinct descendants of their most recent common ancestor (MRCA), form a monophyletic group, the clade AB. Clade AB and taxon C are also sister groups. Taxa A, B, and C, together with all other descendants of their MRCA form the clade ABC. The whole clade ABC is itself a subtree of a larger tree which offers yet more sister group relationships, both among the leaves and among larger, more deeply rooted clades. The tree structure shown connects through its root to the rest of the universal tree of life. In cladistic standards, taxa A, B, and C may represent specimens, species, genera, or any other taxonomic units. If A and B are at the same taxonomic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Predation
Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill the host) and parasitoidism (which always does, eventually). It is distinct from scavenging on dead prey, though many predators also scavenge; it overlaps with herbivory, as seed predators and destructive frugivores are predators. Predators may actively search for or pursue prey or wait for it, often concealed. When prey is detected, the predator assesses whether to attack it. This may involve ambush or pursuit predation, sometimes after stalking the prey. If the attack is successful, the predator kills the prey, removes any inedible parts like the shell or spines, and eats it. Predators are adapted and often highly specialized for hunting, with acute senses such as vision, hearing, or smell. Many predatory animals, both vertebrate and inv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Microbivory
Microbivory (adj. microbivorous, microbivore) is a feeding behavior consisting of eating microbes (especially bacteria) practiced by animals of the mesofauna, microfauna and meiofauna. Microbivorous animals include some soil nematodes, springtails or flies such as '' Drosophila sharpi''. A well known example of microbivorous nematodes is the model roundworm ''Caenorhabditis elegans'' which is maintained in culture in labs on agar plates, fed with the 'OP50' ''Escherichia coli'' strain of bacteria. In food webs of ecosystems, microbivores can be distinguished from detritivores, generally thought playing the roles of decomposers, as they don't consume decaying dead matter but only living microorganisms. Use of term in robotics There is also use of the term 'microbivore' to qualify the concept of robots autonomously finding their energy in the production of bacteria. Robert Freitas Robert A. Freitas Jr. (born 1952) is an American nanotechnologist. Career In 1974, Freitas earne ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Herbivore
A herbivore is an animal anatomically and physiologically adapted to eating plant material, for example foliage or marine algae, for the main component of its diet. As a result of their plant diet, herbivorous animals typically have mouthparts adapted to rasping or grinding. Horses and other herbivores have wide flat teeth that are adapted to grinding grass, tree bark, and other tough plant material. A large percentage of herbivores have mutualistic gut flora that help them digest plant matter, which is more difficult to digest than animal prey. This flora is made up of cellulose-digesting protozoans or bacteria. Etymology Herbivore is the anglicized form of a modern Latin coinage, ''herbivora'', cited in Charles Lyell's 1830 ''Principles of Geology''.J.A. Simpson and E.S.C. Weiner, eds. (2000) ''The Oxford English Dictionary'', vol. 8, p. 155. Richard Owen employed the anglicized term in an 1854 work on fossil teeth and skeletons. ''Herbivora'' is derived from Latin ''herba' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scavenger
Scavengers are animals that consume dead organisms that have died from causes other than predation or have been killed by other predators. While scavenging generally refers to carnivores feeding on carrion, it is also a herbivorous feeding behavior. Scavengers play an important role in the ecosystem by consuming dead animal and plant material. ''Decomposers'' and detritivores complete this process, by consuming the remains left by scavengers. Scavengers aid in overcoming fluctuations of food resources in the environment. The process and rate of scavenging is affected by both biotic and abiotic factors, such as carcass size, habitat, temperature, and seasons. Etymology Scavenger is an alteration of ''scavager,'' from Middle English ''skawager'' meaning "customs collector", from ''skawage'' meaning "customs", from Old North French ''escauwage'' meaning "inspection", from ''schauwer'' meaning "to inspect", of Germanic origin; akin to Old English ''scēawian'' and German ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Algae
Algae (; singular alga ) is an informal term for a large and diverse group of photosynthetic eukaryotic organisms. It is a polyphyletic grouping that includes species from multiple distinct clades. Included organisms range from unicellular microalgae, such as ''Chlorella,'' ''Prototheca'' and the diatoms, to multicellular forms, such as the giant kelp, a large brown alga which may grow up to in length. Most are aquatic and autotrophic (they generate food internally) and lack many of the distinct cell and tissue types, such as stomata, xylem and phloem that are found in land plants. The largest and most complex marine algae are called seaweeds, while the most complex freshwater forms are the ''Charophyta'', a division of green algae which includes, for example, ''Spirogyra'' and stoneworts. No definition of algae is generally accepted. One definition is that algae "have chlorophyll ''a'' as their primary photosynthetic pigment and lack a sterile covering of cells around thei ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mangrove
A mangrove is a shrub or tree that grows in coastal saline water, saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. Mangroves are taxonomically diverse, as a result of convergent evolution in several plant families. They occur worldwide in the tropics and subtropics and even some temperate coastal areas, mainly between latitudes 30° N and 30° S, with the greatest mangrove area within 5° of the equator. Mangrove plant families first appeared during the Late Cretaceous to Paleocene epochs, and became widely distributed in part due to the plate tectonics, movement of tectonic plates. The oldest known fossils of Nypa fruticans, mangrove palm date to 75 million years ago. Mangroves are salt-tolerant trees, also called halophytes, and are adapted to live in harsh coastal conditions. They contain a complex salt filtration system and a complex root system to cope with saltwater immersion and wave action. They are ad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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