Aphanerostethus taiwanus Lewis, Fujisawa & Kojima, 2024

Lewis, Jake H., Kojima, Hiroaki, Suenaga, Miyuki, Petsopoulos, Dimitrios, Fujisawa, Yusuke, Truong, Xuan Lam & Warren, Dan L., 2024, The era of cybertaxonomy: X-ray microtomography reveals cryptic diversity and concealed cuticular sculpture in Aphanerostethus Voss, 1957 (Coleoptera, Curculionidae), ZooKeys 1217, pp. 1-45 : 1-45

Aphanerostethus taiwanus Lewis, Fujisawa & Kojima sp. nov.

Figs 3 , 8 D – F , 10 F , 15 S, T , 21 A, B

Specimens examined.

Holotype: Taiwan: • Tainan Hsein, Kuanzruling , 6. IV. 1965, S. Ueno, male deposited in KUM, JHLHY_DAR_016 . Paratypes: Taiwan: • Taipei Hsein, Kuanzruling, Yangmingshan , 28. III. 1965, Y. Hirashima (1, KUM), JHLHY_DAR_017 ; • Ping Tung Hsein, Kenting , 23. IV. 1965, S. Miyamoto, (1, KUM), JHLHY_DAR_018 ; • Kaohsiung City, Liouguei District, Zhong-Xing-Long Li (near Mt. Taiyuanshan ), 19. X. 2015, H. Yoshitake, (1, NMNST), JHLHY_DAR_019 (EGP 0160 E 02) ; • Pingtung Hsein, Kenting , 4. IV. 1965, T. Saigusa (2, KUM; 1, OIST), JHLHY_DAR_021 , JHLHY_DAR_036 , JHLHY_DAR_070 ; • Pingtung City, Shan Shimen village, Mt. Kao-shih-fo , 14. VII. 2014, Y. Komeda, (1, KUM), JHLHY_DAR_129 ; • Mudan Township , Pingtung County, 22°06'13.46"N, 120°47'33.88"E, 5. III. 2016, Y. Fujisawa, (1, TUA), JHLHY_DAR_600 ; • Mudan Township , Pingtung County, 22°08'21.71"N, 120°51'31.23"E, 9. III. 2016, Y. Fujisawa, (1, TUA), JHLHY_DAR_601 ; • Mudan Township , Pingtung County, 22°05'23"N, 120°47'58"E, 6. III. 2016, Y. Fujisawa & S. Shimizu, (2, TUA), JHLHY_DAR_602 , JHLHY_DAR_603 ; • Pingtung Hsein, Kenting , 22–26. II. 1982, T. Lin and S. C. Lin, (8, TARI), JHLHY_DAR_083 – JHLHY_DAR_090 .

Diagnosis.

Body length 1.7–1.9 mm. Cuticle coated in dark, sandy gray, and white scales in contrasty pattern. Funicle with six articles. Procoxae contiguous. Second and odd-numbered elytral intervals with sub-erect scales. Erect elytral scales evenly distributed, not concentrated in bundle. Femora without ventral teeth. Scutellum reduced. Prosternal cavity prominent and with steep lateral ridges. Metaventrite with a distinct elevated transverse ridge separating the meta- and mesocoxae. Metatibial uncus simple in both sexes. Aedeagus evenly curved at apex, and in lateral view (Fig. 15 S, T ). Internal sac without prominent basal protruding structure (Fig. 15 S, T ).

Distribution.

This species is known from a few sites in Taiwan (Kuanzruling, Kenting, Zhong-Xing-Long Li).

Etymology.

The specific name is an adjective in reference to the collection locality of the species.

Comments.

Our ML analysis (Fig. 3 ) consistently clustered A. taiwanus with A. distinctus (BS: 100); however, the presumed basal position of A. taiwanus (i. e., sister to A. distinctus ) was only weakly supported (BS: 55, PP: 0.84). Here, we separate A. taiwanus from A. distinctus based not on this weak molecular evidence, but primarily on consistent differences in morphology and biogeography. In particular, A. taiwanus possesses an oblique row of erect scales on the pronotum ( A. distinctus with at most 4 or 5 recumbent scales), sub-erect scales on the odd and second elytral intervals ( A. distinctus with recumbent scales only on odd elytral intervals), differences in male genitalia, and apparently non-overlapping geographic range ( A. taiwanus only known from Taiwan; A. distinctus only known from Japan).

Figures

Figure 3. Maximum likelihood tree of Aphanerostethus species based on an 872 base-pair long concatenated DNA matrix (CO 1, Cytb, 16 S) with gene-wise partition modelling (CO 1 / Cytb: GTR + F + I + G 4; 16 S: GTR + F + G 4) constructed in IQ-TREE v. 1.6. 12. Branch support values represent standard nonparametric bootstraps (1000 replicates) and posterior probabilities. The symbol “ – ” indicates a posterior probability less than 50 (i. e., collapsed nodes in the Bayesian Inference tree). EGP codes represent DNA extraction codes and serve also as unique specimen identifiers. Associated Aphanerostethus weevil figures on the right of the tree are not to scale. Note that, except for A. distinctus and A. taiwanus (see Comments under the A. taiwanus species profile), the monophyly of all Aphanerostethus species is strongly supported (BS: 100, PP: 1).

Figure 8. X-ray microtomography generated 3 D models of Aphanerostethus pronota with scales removed, revealing otherwise hidden differences in underlying puncture morphology A – C Aphanerostethus nudus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 012, 013, and 014, respectively) D – F Aphanerostethus taiwanus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 070, 021, and 086, respectively).

Figure 10. X-ray microtomography generated 3 D models of Aphanerostethus elytra with scales removed, revealing differences in the length of the 10 th elytral stria. The yellow and red arrows indicate the base and apex of the 10 th elytral stria, respectively A Aphanerostethus bifidus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 092) B A. falcatus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 172) C A. morimotoi sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 115) D A. decoratus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 079) E A. distinctus (Morimotoi & Miyakawa, 1985) (OKENT 0089414) F A. taiwanus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 070).

Figure 15. Aedeagi of Aphanerostethus species A, B A. bifidus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 102) C, D A. distinctus (Morimoto & Miyakawa, 1985) (OKENT 87658) E, F A. falcatus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 099) G, H A. incurvatus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 100) I, J A. japonicus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 052) K, L A. magnus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 022) M, N A. morimotoi sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 113) O, P A. nudus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 012) Q, R A. spinosus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 077) S, T A. taiwanus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 016) U, V A. vannideki Voss, 1957 (JHLHY _ DAR _ 082).

Figure 21. Lateral and dorsal photographs of Aphanerostethus species A, B Aphanerostethus taiwanus sp. nov. (JHLHY _ DAR _ 084) C, D Aphanerostethus vannideki Voss, 1957 (JHLHY _ DAR _ 081). Scale bars: 0.5 mm.