Summary
NSF PEET Grant DEB-9978110

This proposal outlines research to address the taxonomic and phylogenetic problems in North American higher taxa of the most difficult, speciose and numerically abundant aleocharine staphylinid tribe, the Athetini. The Athetini, with about 173 genera and thousands of species world-wide, is one of the most successful groups of small beetles. They are taxonomically diverse and numerically abundant components of the biological diversity of many microhabitats throughout the world, in which they may be dominant micropredators on nematodes and other microarthropods. Their abundance and diversity suggest that athetines have considerable ecological impact. However, the Athetini is by far the most difficult tribe in the Aleocharinae. The current classification is completely inadequate, and many of the genus-level taxa currently recognized, and the subtribes proposed, cannot be clearly delimited or diagnosed. Furthermore, many recognized genera are heterogeneous and include species that are not congeneric. Attempts to include currently accepted athetine genera in the P.I.’s recent identification guides to North American and Mexican aleocharines were very unsatisfactory. Serious disarray in the classification, and level of knowledge, of the Athetini made it impossible to develop reliable and consistent identification guides to genera and other higher taxa of this tribe.

To address these problems, and provide for the next generation of systematists,
this project will:

1. provide training in modern principles and methods of systematics and related aspects of evolutionary biology and specialized training in systematics and phylogeny of aleocharine staphylinids to a Post-doctoral Associate and 2 Ph.D. level graduate students
2. provide a complete, and fully illustrated, monographic revision of the North American genera of the tribe Athetini (66 currently recognized genera and 29 subgenera, about 654 currently recognized valid species and over 2000 available names)
3. provide a complete photographic image database of types or syntypes of type species for all available names of higher taxa of North American Athetini, and to make these available in a fully searchable web-based format.
4. develop a database of characters and images of athetine taxa in standard DELTA format, and to make these available in electronic format as an INTKEY based identification guide, and as a web-based database.
5. develop a phylogenetic hypotheses of the relationships among the major phylogenetic lineages of athetine higher taxa in the context of the major lineages (tribes) of aleocharine staphylinids.

These projects will make the North American Athetini taxonomically accessible for the first time, and will produce the first comprehensive phylogenetic analysis of major lineages of aleocharines and the Athetini. The training aspects will produce knowledgeable specialists in the Staphylinidae and excellent modern systematists.

April 1, 2001