English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Global: Zendy Plus annual

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Global: Zendy Tools annual

Global: Zendy Free Plan

Global: Zendy Tools monthly

Global: Zendy Plus monthly

Background  While the communities constituted by phytophageous insects and their parasites may represent half of all terrestrial animal species, understanding their diversification remains a major challenge. A neglected idea is that geographic phenotypic variation in a host plant may lead to heterogeneous evolutionary responses of the different members of the associated communities. This could result in diversification on a host plant by ecological speciation in some species, leading to geographic variation in community composition. In this study we investigated geographic variation of inflorescence receptacle size in a plant,  Ficus hirta , and how the hymenopteran community feeding in the inflorescences has responded. Our predictions were:   Inflorescence size variation affects wasp species differently depending on how they access oviposition sites.    In some affected lineages of wasps, we may observe vicariant, parapatric species adapted to different inflorescence sizes.Results  We show that fig (the enclosed inflorescence of  Ficus ) wall thickness varies geographically. The fig-entering pollinating wasp was not affected, while the parasites ovipositing through the fig wall were. Two parapatric species of  Philotrypesis , exhibiting strikingly different ovipositor lengths, were recorded. One species of  Sycoscapter  was also present, and it was restricted, like the shorter-ovipositor  Philotrypesis , to the geographic zone where fig walls were thinner.    Conclusions  Previous work on fig wasps suggested that parapatric geographic ranges among congenerics were due to adaptation to variation in abiotic factors, complemented by interspecific competition. Our results show that parapatric ranges may also result from adaptation to variation in biotic factors. Within an insect community, differences among species in their response to geographic phenotypic variation of their host plant may result in geographically heterogeneous community structure. Such heterogeneity leads to heterogeneous interaction networks among sites. Our results support the hypothesis that plant geographic phenotypic variation can be a driver of diversification in associated insect communities, and can complement other diversification processes.    Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (10.1186/s12862-018-1239-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Plant geographic phenotypic variation drives diversification in its associated community of a phytophagous insect and its parasitoids