Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Entomology
Acute bacterial challenge in Drosophila reveals age and sex dependent feeding and macronutrient choice without generalised anorexia
Published: 2026-04-10
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Entomology, Integrative Biology, Zoology
Sickness behaviours are often interpreted as adaptive host responses that reallocate resources from performance to defence. Anorexia - a reduction in food intake - is one of the most frequently cited examples, yet evidence across insects is variable and rarely separates the effects of wounding, immune stimulation, and live infection. Here we use a factorial design in Drosophila melanogaster to [...]
Diversity and co-occurrence patterns of wood inhabiting insects along a tropical forest regeneration gradient
Published: 2026-04-07
Subjects: Biodiversity, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology, Life Sciences
More than 90% of global carbon released during dead wood decomposition comes from the tropics, where insects contribute significantly to this process, especially in lowland rainforests. Understanding community assembly of dead wood-inhabiting insects is therefore important. We investigated diversity patterns between habitats and host trees, and co-occurrence of wood-inhabiting ants, termites, and [...]
Archilestes californicus McLachlan: a new damselfly for coastal British Columbia (Odonata: Lestidae) with notes on the species’ expansion in the Pacific Northwest
Published: 2026-03-30
Subjects: Entomology
We observed Archilestes californicus McLachlan (California Spreadwing), a damselfly in the family Lestidae, for the first time in south coastal British Columbia. Other records of the species in the Pacific Northwest document a gradual northward range expansion over the last twenty years. In light of this history, Archilestes californicus is expected to spread more widely in southern British [...]
Climate-change-driven shifts in the population dynamics of the invasive tiger mosquito (Aedes albopictus) in the Alps
Published: 2026-03-25
Subjects: Computer Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology
The recent global expansion of the Asian tiger mosquito (Aedes albopictus) across tropical and temperate regions provides a clear example of the mobility and adaptability of invasive species. Among multiple drivers influencing the spread of this species, climate change is emerging as a major driver, creating conditions that favour its persistence and expansion into higher latitudes and [...]
Genetic variance and phenotypic selection on pathogen-linked oviposition choice in Drosophila
Published: 2026-03-23
Subjects: Animal Experimentation and Research, Behavior and Ethology, Entomology, Evolution, Genetics, Integrative Biology, Research Methods in Life Sciences, Zoology
Pathogen-avoidance behaviour is assumed to be adaptive, yet its phenotypic variability and genetic heritability are rarely quantified. In species lacking post-oviposition care, avoiding potentially infectious egg-laying substrates would improve offspring survival and should therefore be under strong selection. We used two-choice oviposition assays to quantify the phenotypic and genetic variance [...]
Insect oviposition as a simple system to investigate the ecology and evolution of pathogen avoidance behaviour
Published: 2026-03-20
Subjects: Animal Experimentation and Research, Behavior and Ethology, Biology, Entomology, Evolution, Immunology and Infectious Disease, Integrative Biology, Laboratory and Basic Science Research Life Sciences, Research Methods in Life Sciences, Zoology
Behavioural avoidance of pathogens and parasites is a ubiquitous first line of defence, yet we lack tractable systems that connect cue detection to fitness consequences, population transmission, and coevolution. We propose insect oviposition as a model that yields general principles for avoidance across taxa. Oviposition decisions fix offspring exposure, they are governed by well‑mapped sensory [...]
Insect monitoring without pitfalls: seven steps for robust insect sensing systems
Published: 2026-02-13
Subjects: Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, Biodiversity, Computer Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology, Life Sciences
Data shortages fuel controversy about an ongoing insect biodiversity crisis. Insects are immensely diverse and functionally critical for ecosystems, yet data on insect trends remain patchy and biased. Sensors, ranging from camera-equipped light traps to weather radar stations, are set to transform entomological data collection. Meanwhile, AI models that extract biological information from sensors [...]
Life cycle complexity drives variation in thermal tolerance and plasticity
Published: 2026-02-09
Subjects: Biodiversity, Biology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology, Evolution, Integrative Biology, Life Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology, Zoology
Accumulating evidence suggests that heat tolerance varies substantially across insect development, yet patterns of variation remain difficult to generalise across species. We discuss how the diversity of insect developmental strategies shapes both the intensity and predictability of thermal environments across ontogeny, and how this likely generates variation in heat tolerance, plasticity, and [...]
Insect Pests on the Move: Climate, Soil, Land Use, and the Search for Contingent Generality
Published: 2026-02-09
Subjects: Agriculture, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology
Climate change is reshaping the geographic distributions of insect pests, with major consequences for agriculture, forestry, and ecosystem stability. Species distribution models (SDMs) are widely used to project these changes, yet most rely primarily on climatic predictors and implicitly assume a degree of generality in species responses that may not hold across diverse taxa. Here, we evaluate [...]
Superorganismal Anisogamy: a Comparative Test of an Extended Theory
Published: 2026-02-04
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology, Evolution, Life Sciences
Multicellular organisms and superorganisms (e.g., ant colonies) are both products of major evolutionary transitions in individuality, and they share many analogous traits. Theory developed to explain the evolution of one such trait, anisogamy, has recently been adapted to explain its superorganismal analogue: large egg-like queens and small sperm-like males. To test this theory with comparative [...]
The conditional ecology of pest suppression: A general mechanistic framework for predicting landscape effects on biological control
Published: 2026-02-03
Subjects: Agriculture, Biodiversity, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology
Landscape heterogeneity often increases natural enemy abundance, yet its effects on crop pest suppression are strikingly inconsistent across empirical studies. We developed a trait-based simulation framework to identify the general mechanisms linking landscape structure to realized pest load. Across >150 in silico experiments, we show that landscape attributes influence biological control by [...]
Developmental density shapes adult mate guarding strategies in an invertebrate
Published: 2026-01-19
Subjects: Behavior and Ethology, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology, Evolution, Life Sciences
Post-copulatory mate guarding is a widespread reproductive strategy that reduces sperm competition but can generate sexual conflict when male and female optima diverge. While mate guarding is known to respond plastically to immediate social conditions, the extent to which early-life social environments of both sexes shape adult guarding behaviour remains poorly understood. We experimentally [...]
Gene expression and structural differences underpinning black and white colouration in spiders
Published: 2025-12-05
Subjects: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology, Life Sciences
The presence of multiple colour variants within a single population, known as colour polymorphism, is a striking example of intraspecific phenotypic variation and a model for studying evolutionary processes. These processes depend on the underlying mechanisms such as the genes and pigments involved; but we currently lack such information for non-model groups such as arachnids. We examined the [...]
POLLEN ANALYSIS AS A REMOTE BIOLOGICAL SENSOR: USING MELISSOPALYNOLOGY AND SURFACE SOIL DATA FOR AN INTEGRATED LANDSCAPE SCALE VEGETATION ASSESSMENT IN SOUTH INDIA
Published: 2025-12-04
Subjects: Botany, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Entomology, Life Sciences, Other Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Other Life Sciences, Other Plant Sciences, Plant Sciences
We use pollen assemblages from two sources, surface soil and bee pollen to characterize modern pollen spectra from contrasting landscapes, evaluate their potential as biological proxies complementing each other in reconstructing vegetation comprised of anemophilous and entomophilous plants. The bee pollen assemblages are from honeycombs and corbicular loads from Apis cerana and A. florea. We try [...]
NEW RECORDS OF TWO SKIPPER BUTTERFLIES (LEPIDOPTERA: HESPERIIDAE) FROM BANGLADESH
Published: 2025-11-26
Subjects: Biodiversity, Entomology
During field surveys of butterflies at Madhobkunda Eco Park, located in the northeastern region of Bangladesh, two species from the Hesperiidae family were recorded for the first time in Bangladesh, namely, Pithauria marsena (Branded Straw Ace) and Celaenorrhinus nigricans (Smallbanded Flat).