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Metabacetus

Kipling Will
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taxon links [up-->]Metabacetus laotinus [up-->]Metabacetus jeanneli [up-->]Metabacetus vandoesburgi [up-->]Metabacetus perakianus [up-->]Metabacetus immarginatus [up-->]Metabacetus arrowi [down<--]Abacetini Interpreting the tree
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Containing group: Abacetini

Introduction

Metabacetus is a small and rather obscure group of species in the Oriental and Pacific region. There are few specimens in collections and little is known about their habits. Metabacetus vandoesburgi was collected in very wet forest while headlamp searching the ground at night in Sabah (K.Will). Recent study of types and available material (K. Will unpublished) suggests that there are many undescribed species to be discovered but more specimens are needed before the study of this group can continue.

Characteristics

These species lack the most obvious characteristics and likely synapomorphies for Abacetus and its near relatives–the eccentrically inserted second antennomere and the strongly transverse mentum. But they share with other abacetines the lack of the angular base of stria 1; a single pair of deeply impressed, linear basal impressions of the pronotum; deeply impressed, elongate frontal impressions on the head; sinuate anterior coxal sulcus and coiled spermatheca.

Metabacetus vandoesburgi has small apical spines on the elytra, which is very unusual for an abacetine, though known from many platynines and some caelostomines.

Discussion of Phylogenetic Relationships

Although none of these characteristics mentioned above represent unique synapomorphies, i.e., all are found in other pterostichine-grade taxa (Will 2002), and several are certainly plesiomorphic, in combination they define a cluster of taxa including some members of Jeannel’s Celioschesini (1948), Moore’s abacetine series (1965) and various taxa classified in Pterostichini from Asia and Africa. The exact composition of this set of taxa is still unclear, however, current studies of both morphological and molecular characters (Will unpublished) suggest that there is a monophyletic group that includes taxa such as Metabacetus, Aristopus, Cosmodiscus, Tiferonia and Mateuellus.

Title Illustrations
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Scientific Name Metabacetu arrowi
Identified By K.Will
Life Cycle Stage Adult
Image Use creative commons This media file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License - Version 3.0.
Copyright © Kipling Will
About This Page

Kipling Will
University of California, Berkeley, California, USA

Correspondence regarding this page should be directed to Kipling Will at

Page: Tree of Life Metabacetus. Authored by Kipling Will. The TEXT of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License - Version 3.0. Note that images and other media featured on this page are each governed by their own license, and they may or may not be available for reuse. Click on an image or a media link to access the media data window, which provides the relevant licensing information. For the general terms and conditions of ToL material reuse and redistribution, please see the Tree of Life Copyright Policies.

Citing this page:

Will, Kipling. 2006. Metabacetus. Version 07 July 2006 (under construction). http://tolweb.org/Metabacetus/51314/2006.07.07 in The Tree of Life Web Project, http://tolweb.org/

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