Biodiversity Data Journal :
Taxonomic Paper
|
Corresponding author: Ian J Kitching (i.kitching@nhm.ac.uk), Rodolphe Rougerie (rodolphe.rougerie@mnhn.fr)
Academic editor: Yasen Mutafchiev
Received: 13 Nov 2017 | Accepted: 08 Feb 2018 | Published: 12 Feb 2018
© 2018 Ian Kitching, Rodolphe Rougerie, Andreas Zwick, Chris Hamilton, Ryan St Laurent, Stefan Naumann, Liliana Ballesteros Mejia, Akito Kawahara
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
Kitching I, Rougerie R, Zwick A, Hamilton C, St Laurent R, Naumann S, Ballesteros Mejia L, Kawahara A (2018) A global checklist of the Bombycoidea (Insecta: Lepidoptera). Biodiversity Data Journal 6: e22236. https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.6.e22236
|
Bombycoidea is an ecologically diverse and speciose superfamily of Lepidoptera. The superfamily includes many model organisms, but the taxonomy and classification of the superfamily has remained largely in disarray. Here we present a global checklist of Bombycoidea. Following
This checklist represents the first effort to synthesize the current taxonomic treatment of the entire superfamily. It includes 12,159 names and references to their authors, and it accounts for the recent burst in species and subspecies descriptions within family Saturniidae (ca. 1,500 within the past 10 years) and to a lesser extent in Sphingidae (ca. 250 species over the same period). The changes to the higher classification of Saturniidae proposed by
Anthelidae, Apatelodidae, Bombycidae, Bombycoidea, Brahmaeidae, Carthaeidae, Classification, Endromidae, Eupterotidae, Phiditiidae, Saturniidae, Sphingidae
Bombycoidea is one of the most charismatic and well-studied moth lineages. The superfamily is mosty diversified in the intertropical region of the globe and currently includes ten families and more than 500 genera (
Here, we present a best estimate on the current state of the taxonomic diversity of Bombycoidea, based on the compilation of published nomenclatural acts as well as the consideration of recent phylogenetic work on the superfamily.
We have constructed a comprehensive table of bombycoid taxa, including their synonyms, authors, and publication years. Much of this information is erroneous in the literature, and here we comprehensively clarify the taxonomy of the entire superfamily, although we also acknowledge that our checklist may still contain errors and will inevitably become outdated with the expected continued progress in the systematics of these moths. We also present a simplified higher-level phylogeny of Bombycoidea (Fig.
Simplified family-level phylogeny from
In this section we provide a list of conventions and abbreviations used, as well as a brief account of the main resources used to compile this checklist for each of the ten families treated.
This Checklist uses the original orthography of all taxon names and does not apply gender agreement (
The following abbreviations and terms are used in the Checklist:
Code: the Fourth Edition of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (1999).
comb. nov.: an new combination of a species into a genus.
comb. rev.: a revived combination of a species into a genus. "Comb. rev." is often misinterpreted as meaning a "revised" combination. However, the term refers specifically to the reinstatement of a previous combination (i.e., a revival, "reviviscens"), not a revised combination, which is a more general concept.
incertae sedis: of uncertain taxonomic position.
incorrect original spelling: an original spelling of a name that is deemed incorrect under Articles 32.4 and 32.5 of the Code.
infrasubspecific: a name that ranks lower than a subspecies; such names are not regulated by the Code.
junior homonym: of two homonyms, the later established, or in the case of simultaneous establishment the one not given precedence under article 24 of the Code.
nomen dubium: a name of unknown or doubtful application.
nomen novum (new replacement name): a name expressly established to replace an already established name, most commonly a junior homonym.
nomen nudum: a name that, if published before 1931, fails to conform to Article 12 of the Code; or, if published after 1930, fails to conform to Article 13 of the Code; an unavailable name, with no type specimen.
nomen oblitum: applied after 1 January 2000 to a name, unused since 1899, which as a result of and action taken under Article 23.9.2 of the Code does not take precedence over a younger synonym or homonym in prevailing usage.
nomen protectum: a name that has been given precedence over its unused senior synonym or senior homonym relegated to the status of nomen oblitum.
rejected name: a name which, under the provisions of the Code, cannot be used as a valid name and which has been set aside in favour of another name, usually by the application of the plenary powers of the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature; a name included in a work that has been rejected by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature and placed on the Official Index of Rejected and Invalid Works in Zoological Nomenclature.
stat. nov.: a new status (e.g., a subspecies name raised to species status for the first time).
stat. rev.: a revived status (e.g., a species name reinstated to species status from synonymy). "Stat. rev." is often misinterpreted as meaning a "revised" status. However, the term refers specifically to the reinstatement of a previous status (i.e., a revival; "reviviscens"), not a revised status, which is a more general concept.
syn. nov.: a new synonymy.
syn. rev.: a revived synonymy (i.e the return to synonymic status of a name that had been so treated in the past before being treated as a valid name).
unavailable name: a name that does not conform to Articles 10 to 20 of the Code, or that is an excluded name under Article 1.3 of the Code.
unnecessary replacement name: a replacement name proposed in error.
unjustified emendation: an intentional change to the original spelling of an available name that is not justified under Article 33.2.2 of the Code.
?: of uncertain status.
The classification and nomenclature within Anthelidae follows
The exclusively New World Apatelodidae is treated here as a family (
Bombycidae is treated here as containing two subfamilies, Bombycinae and Epiinae (
The family Carthaeidae comprises a single genus with a single included species. The classification follows
On the basis of a molecular phylogenetic analysis,
The higher classification of Eupterotidae follows
Following
The classification and nomenclature of the New World Saturniidae is based on the revisions of Claude Lemaire (
Based on a subjective, manually constructed cladogram using characters derived mostly from the colour patterns of the adults and larvae,
The classification and nomenclature of Sphingidae follows the Sphingidae Taxonomic Inventory (STI) (
The global checklist of Bombycoidea moths is provided here as a table in Suppl. material
Number of valid genus and species names in each of the ten families of Bombycoidea.
Family | Number of genera | Number of species |
---|---|---|
Anthelidae Turner, 1904 | 9 | 94 |
Apatelodidae Neumoegen & Dyar, 1894 | 12 | 182 |
Bombycidae Latreille, 1802 | 27 | 202 |
Brahmaeidae Swinhoe, 1892 | 6 | 68 |
Carthaeidae Common, 1966 | 1 | 1 |
Endromidae Boisduval, 1828 | 16 | 70 |
Eupterotidae Swinhoe, 1892 | 60 | 396 |
Phiditiidae Minet, 1994 | 4 | 23 |
Saturniidae Boisduval, 1837 | 180 | 3,454 |
Sphingidae Latreille, 1802 | 205 | 1,602 |
See table in Suppl. material
We thank Jesse Breinholt, Seth Bybee, Yash Sondhi, James Theobald, Martjin Timmermans and Deborah Glass for their discussions. This study was funded by NSF grant numbers DEB-1557007, IOS-1121739, DBI-1349345 and DBI-1601369 to AYK, and by NERC grant number NE/P003915/1 to IJK. The Florida Museum of Natural History and the NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship award in Biology (PRFB) #1612862 supported CAH. This research is also supported by the French Foundation for Research on Biodiversity (FRB: www.fondationbiodiversite.fr) in the context of the CESAB project "Global patterns of insect diversity, distribution and evolutionary distinctness - What can we learn from two of the best-documented families of moths?" (ACTIAS).
Ian J. Kitching and Rodolphe Rougerie have agreed to shared first-authorship of this work.
This table provides a list of 12,159 taxon names for the Bombycoidea superfamily. It includes both valid and synonymous names, with their authorship and information, when known, about the current genus+name binomen being an original combination or not.