Implications of a Dating Analysis of Hippoboscoidea(Diptera) for the Origins of Phoresis in Feather Lice(Psocodea: Phthiraptera: Philopteridae)

摘要

Hippoboscidae (Samouelle 1819)is a family of blood feeding Diptera, which can be phoretic vectors for parasiticfeather lice(Philopteridae Burmeister 1838). Hippoboscid flies are understood to provide opportunitiesfor increased instances of dispersal and host-switching for feather lice. This intimate relationship betweenhippoboscid fly and feather louse may have hypothetically existed since the origin of avian-specializedHippoboscidae. Thus, phoretic dispersal may have affected patterns of diversification in feather lice overmillions of years. To test this, a dating analysis of a previously published Hippoboscoidea data set was performedusing known fossil calibrations. The results of the dating analysis suggest Hippoboscoidea diversifiedshortly after the K-Pg boundary, similar to their modern vertebrate hosts. Amaximum age of the avian feedingOrnithomyini is estimated to have occurred around the origin of parasitic feather lice. This maximum divergencedate suggest this phoretic relationship could haveexisted for much of the diversification of avian featherlice and had the potential to influence patterns of diversification due to dispersal and host-switching amongavian hosts.