Morpho-Systematic Studies on Collembola IV Chaetotaxy of the Entomobryidae and its Phylogenetical Significance

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Language: English with Polish summary

From the introduction:

"The studies of Collembolan chaetotaxy [the arrangement of bristles (macrochaetae) on an insect or mite, or taxonomy based on their position and size] started in the forties of this century have led to the accumulation of extremely abundant factual material. It was demonstrated relatively early that the chaetotaxy of tergites in rather primitive families included in the Poduromorpha is generally fairly uniform [...] So far no attempts have been made to form such a system for the Entomobryomorpha [...] In the present publication, after describing the study material and methods [...], in which especially much room is given to the criteria of homologization of setae [...], I discuss the elements of the chaetotaxy of the Entomobryidae and their notation system made up of letters and numbers [...] and describe the chaetotaxy of individual tergites of the species under study. The chaetotaxy of members of the genera Orchesellides, Drepanura and Drepanosira are described here for the first time and so is the chaetotaxy of the scaled species [...] as well as the chaetotaxy of such areas, almost completely omitted so far, as the anterior and lateral parts of the mesonotum, lateral parts of the remaining tergites and the whole urotergite V. After short remarks on the chaetotaxy of the Entomobryidae incertae sedis [...] I come to more general problems. In Section IX I deal with the evolution of chaetotaxy, which constitutes an essential element of the evolution of body covering structures, with the classification of the Entomobryidae and related groups, and also with their phylogenetic relationships. Owing to the insufficient material that I had at my disposal, the problems discussed in the last two sections, could be worked out only in general outlines and some of the questions could merely be presented without being answered. The final remarks [...] are rather a programme of future researches than a recapitulation."

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