Phylogeny and feeding trait evolution of the mega‐diverse Gelechioidea (Lepidoptera: Obtectomera): new insight from 19 nuclear genes
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract The G elechioidea (>18 000 species), one of the largest superfamilies of L epidoptera, are a major element of terrestrial ecosystems and include important pests and biological model species. Despite much recent progress, our understanding of the classification, phylogeny and evolution of G elechioidea remains limited. Building on recent molecular studies of this superfamily and a recently revised family/subfamily classification, we provide an independent estimate of among‐family relationships, with little overlap in gene sample. We analysed up to five nuclear genes, totalling 6633 bp, for each of 77 gelechioids, plus up to 14 additional genes, for a total of 14 826 bp, in 45 of those taxa and all 19 outgroup taxa. Our maximum‐likelihood ( ML ) analyses, like those of previous authors, strongly support monophyly for most multiply‐sampled families and subfamilies, but very weakly support most relationships above the family level. Our tree looks superficially divergent from that of the most recent molecular study of gelechioids, but when the previous tree is re‐rooted to accord maximally with ours, the two phylogenies agree entirely on the deepest‐level divergences in G elechioidea, and strongly though incompletely on among‐family relationships within the major groups. This concordance between independent studies is evidence that the groupings (or at least the unrooted branching order) are probably accurate, despite the low bootstrap values. After re‐rooting, both trees divide the families into three monophyletic groups: a ‘ G elechiid A ssemblage,’ consisting of G elechiidae and C osmopterigidae; a ‘ S cythridid A ssemblage,’ consisting of S tathmopodidae, S cythrididae, B lastobasidae, E lachistidae, M omphidae, C oleophoridae and B atrachedridae; and a ‘ D epressariid A ssemblage,’ consisting of A utostichidae, X yloryctidae, L ecithoceridae, O ecophoridae, D epressariidae and L ypusidae. Within the largest family, Gelechiidae, our results strongly support the pairing of A nomologinae with G elechiinae, in accordance with a recent study of this family. Relationships among the other subfamilies, however, conflict moderately to strongly between studies, leaving the intrafamily phylogeny unsettled. Within the ‘ S cythridid A ssemblage,’ both trees support an ‘ SSB clade’ consisting of B lastobasidae + ( S cythrididae + S tathmopodidae), strongly resolved only in our results. Coleophoridae + B atrachedridae is supported, albeit weakly, in both trees, and only M omphidae differ in position between studies. Within the ‘ D epressariid A ssemblage,’ both trees support an ‘ AXLO ’ clade consisting of A utostichidae, X yloryctidae, L ecithoceridae and O ecophoridae. The monophyly of this clade and relationships therein are supported weakly in previous results but strongly in ours. The recently re‐defined family D epressariidae is paraphyletic in our tree, but the evidence against depressariid monophyly is very weak. There is moderate support for a core group of D epressariidae consisting, among the seven subfamilies we sampled, of D epressariinae, A eolanthinae and H ypertrophinae. We show that gelechioids have a higher total number and percentage of species that are saprophagous as larvae than any other apoditrysian superfamily, that saprophagy is concentrated primarily in the ‘ AXLO clade,’ and that the ancestral gelechioid condition was probably feeding on live plants. Among the living‐plant feeders, concealed external feeding was probably the ancestral state. The multiple origins of internal feeding of various kinds, including leaf mining (otherwise almost unknown in A poditrysia), are restricted mostly to the S cythridid and G elechiid A ssemblages. The traits that predispose or permit lineages to adopt these unusual life histories are worthy of study.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".