Volume 1, Issue 2 (2021)

Investigating Hormesis Effects on Insect Populations

Written by Maria M. Nakamura Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

The present study aimed to investigate hormesis and its effect on insect populations. Hormesis is an adaptive response in which low doses of chemicals have a stimulating effect on living organisms. This mechanism suggests that mild stressors can improve the host defense system, while higher concentrations of the same stressors can be harmful or fatal. Insects are often exposed to various stressors, including chemicals, heat, and nutrient deficiencies, frequently at low levels. The hormetic effec

Seasonal Dynamics of Carabus Coriaceus (Coleoptera: Carabidae) in the Eastern Range

Written by Ahmed Costa Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

This study investigated the seasonal activity of Carabus coriaceus imagos in the eastern portion of their distribution range, particularly in mixed and pine forests located in the Mordovia State Nature Reserve and National Park “Smolny” (Republic of Mordovia). The period of activity varied between years, commencing in late April in 2018 and early May in 2019, and extending until mid-September and October. Population density peaked between mid-July and August. The warmer spring of 2018 led to an

Beetle Species Associated with Nesting Birds of the North Caucasus

Written by James Rossi Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

This paper provides a faunistic inventory of Coleoptera species from 13 families, including 40 species collected from the nests of 24 bird species in the North Caucasus. Compared to our previous data, the list of beetle species has been expanded by 2 more species. Around 20 species were identified as accidental visitors to the bird nests, but these are not discussed further in this paper. The remaining species show intricate biocenotic interactions with their host nests. The process of adaptatio

Assessment of Solid Lure Plugs and Insecticide Dispensers in Capturing Dacine Fruit Flies Versus Non-Target Species

Written by Jun Singh Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

This study evaluated the effectiveness of solid male lures, specifically methyl eugenol (ME), cuelure (C-L), and tri-med lure (TML) combined with insecticides, for trapping fruit flies in three different green zones in Bangladesh. The study also investigated the non-target insect attraction to traps using these lures. The traps were set up across nine locations in three distinct experimental areas: i. Atomic Energy Research Establishment (AERE) colony, ii. AERE office campus, and iii. Jahangirna

Integrative Insect Species Delimitation Requires Explicit Reconciliation of Morphological Evidence, Molecular Signals, and Biological Meaning

Written by Youssef Hariri Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

Species delimitation in insects increasingly combines morphology, DNA barcodes, multilocus phylogenies, genomic partitions, geography, ecology and reproductive information. Yet integration is often treated as accumulation: concordant signals are counted as support, whereas discordant signals are framed as problems to be resolved by choosing a preferred dataset. This conceptual analysis argues that the principal difficulty is instead inferential. Different evidence classes record different biolog

Revising Insect Species Boundaries Without Destabilizing Taxonomy Requires Governance of Conflict Rather Than Resistance to Change

Written by David Osei Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

Species boundaries in insects are increasingly revised as genomic, morphological, ecological, geographic, behavioural, and life-stage evidence are combined at finer resolution. Such revisions are often portrayed as a conflict between taxonomic accuracy and nomenclatural stability. That framing is incomplete because instability can arise not from revision itself but from poorly governed transitions between observation, species-level interpretation, and nomenclatural action. This perspective devel

Rapid Insect Radiations Expose Predictable Errors When Gene Trees Are Interpreted Directly as Species Histories

Written by Kristian Eriksen Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

Rapid insect radiations are difficult phylogenetic problems not simply because internal branches are short, but because several biological and analytical processes can produce the same visible symptom: discordant gene trees. This phylogenetic framework argues that a recurrent error occurs when an estimated gene tree is read directly as a species history. The framework separates four inferential objects—observed molecular characters, gene-copy genealogies, estimated gene trees, and species-histor

Nutrient Sensing and Hormonal State Jointly Regulate Insect Life-History Decisions Beyond Simple Energetic Constraint

Written by Mikko Lahtinen Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

Insect life-history responses to nutrition are often described as consequences of energetic or substrate limitation: growth slows when resources decline, reproduction contracts when nutrient supply is inadequate, and survival trade-offs emerge when allocation becomes constrained. This interpretation is necessary but incomplete. Nutrients also act as regulatory information, while juvenile hormone, ecdysteroids, insulin/insulin-like growth factor signaling, target of rapamycin, AMP-activated prote

Thermal Plasticity Across Insect Life Stages and Its Consequences for Development, Performance, and Fitness

Written by Omar Zayed Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

Thermal plasticity is often evaluated within a single insect life stage and then generalized to whole-organism performance or climatic vulnerability. That approach is problematic because temperature acts on a developmental sequence in which sensitivity, physiological capacity, resource demand, mobility, and reproductive function change over time. This integrative review examines how thermal responses arising during embryonic, larval or nymphal, metamorphic, pupal, and adult stages can persist or

Repeatable Behavior, Context Dependence, and Fitness Relevance in the Emerging Ecology of Insect Personality

Written by Wei Zhang Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

Consistent behavioral differences among individuals are increasingly documented in insects, yet evidence of repeatability is often interpreted more broadly than the underlying designs permit. In particular, short-term behavioral consistency can be conflated with persistence across developmental stages or environments, and associations with physiological performance, task allocation, survival-related outcomes, or reproduction can be interpreted as evidence of generalized fitness advantage. This s

Congruence, Conflict, and Evidential Weight Across Morphological, Molecular, Ecological, and Behavioral Data in Integrative Insect Taxonomy

Written by Rafael Mendoza Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

Integrative insect taxonomy increasingly combines morphology, DNA barcodes, multilocus and genome-scale data, ecology, geography, and reproductive evidence, yet agreement among these sources is often treated more simply than the underlying inference permits. This critical review examines how evidential classes contribute to species delimitation and higher-level taxonomic interpretation when they converge, conflict, or share non-independent sources of error. The central problem is not whether mol

Hormonal Crosstalk, Gene Regulation, and Developmental Timing in the Molecular Control of Insect Metamorphosis

Written by Wouter De Smet Published on Vol 1 Issue 2, 2021

Insect metamorphosis is often described as a sequence in which changing ecdysteroid and juvenile-hormone titres activate genetically encoded developmental programs. That description is useful but incomplete because endocrine concentration, receptor occupancy, stage identity, chromatin state, and tissue competence are not interchangeable regulatory levels. Recent work instead supports a distributed control problem: steroidogenic tissues integrate nutritional and receptor-tyrosine-kinase inputs; j

Volume 1, Issue 2 (2021)

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