The SISBIOTA-Diptera Brazilian Network: A long-term survey of Diptera from unexplored Brazilian Western Arc of Amazon, Cerrado, and Pantanal

ABSTRACT The SISBIOTA-BRASIL was a three-year multimillion-dollar research program of the Brazilian government to document plants and animals in endangered/understudied areas and biomes in Brazil. Distributional patterns and the historical events that generated them are extensively unknown regarding Brazilian fauna and flora. This deficiency hinders the development of conservation policies and the understanding of evolutionary processes. Conservation decisions depend on precise knowledge of the taxonomy and geographic distribution of species. Given such a premise, we proposed to research the diversity of Diptera of the Brazilian western arc of Amazon, Cerrado, and Pantanal in the states of Mato Grosso, Mato Grosso do Sul, and Rondônia. Three important biomes of the South American continent characterize these Brazilian states: Amazon forest, Cerrado (Brazilian Savannah), and Pantanal. Besides their ecological relevance, these biomes historically lack intensive entomological surveys. Therefore, they are much underrepresented in the Brazilian natural history collections and in the scientific literature, which is further aggravated by the fact that these areas are being exponentially and rapidly converted to commercial lands. Our project involved over 90 collaborators from 24 different Brazilian institutions and one from Colombia among researchers, postdocs, graduate and undergraduate students, and technicians. We processed and analyzed nearly 300,000 specimens from ~60 families of Diptera collected with a large variety of methods in the sampled areas. Here, we provide a detailed overview of the genera and species diversity of 41 families treated. Our results point to a total of 2,130 species and 514 genera compiled and identified for the three states altogether, with an increase of 41% and 29% in the numbers of species and genera known for the three states combined, respectively. Overall, the 10 most species-rich families were Tachinidae, Cecidomyiidae, Tabanidae, Psychodidae, Sarcophagidae, Stratiomyidae, Bombyliidae, Syrphidae, Tephritidae, and Asilidae. The 10 most diverse in the number of genera were Tachinidae, Stratiomyidae, Asilidae, Mycetophilidae, Syrphidae, Tabanidae, Muscidae, Dolichopodidae, Sarcophagidae, and Chloropidae. So far, 111 scientific papers were published regarding taxonomic, phylogenetic, and biogeographical aspects of the studied families, with the description of 101 new species and three new genera. We expect that additional publications will result from this investigation because several specimens are now curated and being researched by specialists.

Diplosmittia caribensis, a new Orthocladiinae (Diptera: Chironomidae) from the Dominican Republic.

The genus Diplosmittia was erected by Sæther (1981) based on Diplosmittia harrisoni from St. Lucia and St. Vincent in the British West Indies. Prior to the present study the genus comprised nine species, all except D. carinata Sæther were known only from Neotropical Region (Ashe & O'Connor, 2012). During sampling in the surroundings of a highly organic polluted river, in the National Botanical Garden in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, the present second author collected several imagines of Diplosmittia that did not fit any taxon treated in the recent review of the genus (Pinho et al. 2009). In the present paper, the male of this new species is described and illustrated.

Amazonimyia gigantea gen. n., sp. n., a new Tanypodinae (Diptera: Chironomidae) from the Neotropical Region.

A new genus, Amazonimyia, is established for a species of the tribe Pentaneurini (Diptera, Chironomidae, Tanypodinae) from the Amazon Rainforest in northern Brazil. Generic diagnoses for adult male and pupa are provided together with descriptions of a new species, Amazonimyia gigantea.

A review of Neotropical species in Thienemanniella Kieffer (Diptera, Chironomidae).

Three species previously described from the neotropical region are revised and four new species are described: Thienemanniella biobio sp. n. and T. manihuales sp. n. as males and pupae from Chile, T. sancticaroli sp. n. and T ubatuba sp. n. as males, females and immature stages from Brazil. The new Thienemanniella spreta species group is delimited consisting of T. spreta (Roback) sensu Sublette & Sasa, T. sanctivincenta Saether, T. liae Paggi, T. sancticaroli sp. n. and T. ubatuba sp. n. Keys to the known Neotropical males, pupae and larvae are presented.