Patawatermes, 2016

Bourguignon, Thomas, Scheffrahn, Rudolf H., Nagy, Zoltán Tamás, Sonet, Gontran, Host, Benoît & Roisin, Yves, 2016, Towards a revision of the Neotropical soldierless termites (Isoptera: Termitidae): redescription of the genus Grigiotermes Mathews and description of five new genera, Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 176 (1), pp. 15-35 : 25-26

PATAWATERMES BOURGUIGNON & ROISIN GEN. NOV.

( FIGS 5A–E , 7G, H , 8E , 9I–L , 10 , 11 ; TABLES 8, 9)

Type species: Anoplotermes turricola Silvestri, 1901 , by present designation.

Description

Worker: Medium- to large-sized, head width between 0.69 and 1.1 mm. Head pale yellow, rounded, with scattered minute setae and about 100 long bristles. Fontanelle small, almost indistinct. Mandibles as in Figure 5C . Fore tibia as in Figure 5D . Digestive tract as in Figure 8E . Enteric valve inserted into a tubular extension of the paunch, with well-developed armature composed of six rounded spiny pads. Anterior portion of enteric valve composed of six ovoid cushions, each composed of about 50–80 scales with posterior spiny fringes. Mesenteric junction forming a small ball overlapping by the proctodeum, slightly elongat- ed to form a short, distinct mixed segment. Hindgut with a wide P1.

Imago: Sclerotized body parts dark brown, covered by thousands of tiny setae. Head covered by about 100 scattered long bristles. Eyes and ocelli large. Fontanelle fairly small- to medium-sized, situated at the anterior level of eyes. Pronotum elongated, covered by a few dozen long bristles. Posterior margins of meso- and metanotum slightly emarginated, with strongly rounded angles.

Diagnosis

Patawatermes is very similar to Grigiotermes but can easily be distinguished from it by the shape of the armature of its worker enteric valve. Additionally, the worker digestive tract has an enlarged P1 but not to the same extent as in Grigiotermes . The same morphological criteria also allow a clear distinction from other genera of South American soldierless termites.

Etymology

We named this genus ‘ Patawatermes ’ in honour of Camp Patawa and its managers, from where we carried out several sampling campaigns.

PATAWATERMES NIGRIPUNCTATUS ( EMERSON, 1925)

Figures

Figure 5. Worker. Patawatermes turricola comb. nov.: A, enteric valve (spread on slide). Patawatermes nigripunctatus comb. nov.: B, enteric valve (spread on slide); C, mandibles; D, foreleg; E, head.

Figure 7. Worker enteric valve armature, depicted by confocal microscopy. A, Grigiotermes hageni comb. nov.; B, Amplucrutermes inflatus sp. nov.; C, Humutermes krishnai sp. nov.; D, Humutermes noiroti sp. nov.; E, Hydrecotermes arienesho sp. nov.; F, Hydrecotermes kawaii sp. nov.; G, Patawatermes turricola comb. nov.; H, Patawatermes nigripunctatus comb. nov.; I, Rubeotermes jheringi comb. nov. (G, I, reproduced with the permission of Host et al., 2014).

Figure 8. Worker digestive tracts. A, Grigiotermes hageni comb. nov.; B, Amplucrutermes inflatus sp. nov.; C, Humutermes krishnai sp. nov.; D, Hydrecotermes arienesho sp. nov.; E, Patawatermes nigripunctatus comb. nov.; F, Rubeotermes jheringi comb. nov.. From left to right: dorsal, right, ventral, and left views.

Figure 9. Head, pronotum, mesonotum, and metanotum of alates. A, B, Grigiotermes hageni comb. nov.; C, D, Humutermes krishnai sp. nov.; E, F, Hydrecotermes arienesho sp. nov.; G, H, Hydrecotermes kawaii sp. nov.; I, J, Patawatermes turricola comb. nov.; K, L, Patawatermes nigripunctatus comb. nov.; M, N, Rubeotermes jheringi comb. nov. Scale bars = 1 mm.

Figure 10. Distribution maps of samples examined in this study.

Figure 11. Majority rule consensus phylogenetic tree including 13 focal species constructed by Bayesian inference. Numbers on branches are posterior probabilities. Species from South America are in blue font. The scale bar represents the number of mutation per site.