Tishechkin D.Yu. 2020. Comparative analysis of male calling signals in closely related species of Macropsis Lewis, 1836 (Homoptera: Auchenorrhyncha: Cicadellidae: Eurymelinae: Macropsini) reveals possible ways of evolution of the signal temporal pattern // Russian Entomol. J. Vol.29. No.3: 247–260 [in English].
Department of Entomology, Faculty of Biology, M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University, Vorobyevy Gory, Moscow 119234, Russia. E-mail: macropsis@yandex.ru
doi: 10.15298/rusentj.29.3.03
ABSTRACT. It is shown that, in some closely related Macropsis species, male calling signals consist of similar components but clearly differ in the duration of homologous parts, the shape of syllables, the presence/absence of additional components, or the presence/absence of gaps between the signal parts. In some other leafhoppers, such differences are intraspecific and can be observed in the signals of males from the same population and even in the same male. Thus, in the considered Macropsis species, signals were apparently formed by fixing different originally intraspecific variants in different phylogenetic lineages in the course of their divergence. This suggests that intraspecific variability can become a basis for rapid divergence of signal patterns if in different populations different pattern variants gain a selective advantage. Based on this, we can assume that male calling signals in leafhoppers can evolve not only by a gradual change in the quantitative parameters such as the signal parts duration but also through qualitative changes of temporal pattern due to adding new components, change of a syllable shape, and splitting a single signal into several parts. Since in closely related leafhopper species it is the differences in signal patterns that provide reproductive isolation, such changes can result in rapid speciation.
KEY WORDS: Homoptera, Auchenorrhyncha, Cicadellidae, Macropsis, calling signals, variability, evolution.