Titre :	Snout moths: unraveling the taxonomic diversity of a speciose group in the neotropics
Type de document :	texte imprimé
Auteurs :	M. Alma Solis, Auteur
Année de publication :	1996
Importance :	p 231-242
Langues :	Anglais (eng)
Catégories :	SCIENCES DE LA VIE
Mots-clés :	BIODIVERSITE  DIVERSITE TAXONOMIQUE  PYRALIDE  PAPILLON
Résumé :	Biodiversity studies often ignore the insects, one of the most important and diverse groups of organisms on this planet. With estimates of 5 to 30 million species of insects, the simple request to provide a scientific name can be nearly impossible for insect taxonomists , in strong contrast with the capability of vertebrate taxonomists who work with smaller and better-known taxa. Within the insects, butterflies have been regarded as good subjects for biodiversity studies because there are fewer species and they are taxonomically well known. Butterflies constitute about 15% of the 140 000+species of lepidoptera ; the rest are moths. However, it would be a mistake to utilize only less diverse groups in biodiversity studies, because the more speciose groups such as moths may have a greater impact on the Earth’s sustainable resources. Moths have many positive attributes for biodiversity studies : they are found in almost all habitats and niches, possess many specialized behaviors, are good indicators of areas of endemism, show rapid responses to environmental disturbance, can be sampled with quantitative methods and have many taxa that are readily identifiable . The keys to the transfer of information about a speciose group of insects in a short period of time are collections and taxonomists. Taxonomic refinement and computerization of pyraloid collections will provide an impetus for studies of diversity and faunistic composition of snout moths in other tropical areas and the most difficult aspect but the most important has been the transfer of information from taxonomists who have volunteered their time and from the past work of taxonomists that we now build on and use to answer some of the present questions.
Numéro du document :	A/BIO
Niveau Bibliographique :	2
Bull1 (Theme principale) :	BIOLOGIE
Bull2 (Theme secondaire) :	BIOLOGIE GENERALE

Snout moths: unraveling the taxonomic diversity of a speciose group in the neotropics [texte imprimé] / M. Alma Solis, Auteur . - 1996 . - p 231-242.
Langues : Anglais (eng)

Catégories :	SCIENCES DE LA VIE
Mots-clés :	BIODIVERSITE  DIVERSITE TAXONOMIQUE  PYRALIDE  PAPILLON
Résumé :	Biodiversity studies often ignore the insects, one of the most important and diverse groups of organisms on this planet. With estimates of 5 to 30 million species of insects, the simple request to provide a scientific name can be nearly impossible for insect taxonomists , in strong contrast with the capability of vertebrate taxonomists who work with smaller and better-known taxa. Within the insects, butterflies have been regarded as good subjects for biodiversity studies because there are fewer species and they are taxonomically well known. Butterflies constitute about 15% of the 140 000+species of lepidoptera ; the rest are moths. However, it would be a mistake to utilize only less diverse groups in biodiversity studies, because the more speciose groups such as moths may have a greater impact on the Earth’s sustainable resources. Moths have many positive attributes for biodiversity studies : they are found in almost all habitats and niches, possess many specialized behaviors, are good indicators of areas of endemism, show rapid responses to environmental disturbance, can be sampled with quantitative methods and have many taxa that are readily identifiable . The keys to the transfer of information about a speciose group of insects in a short period of time are collections and taxonomists. Taxonomic refinement and computerization of pyraloid collections will provide an impetus for studies of diversity and faunistic composition of snout moths in other tropical areas and the most difficult aspect but the most important has been the transfer of information from taxonomists who have volunteered their time and from the past work of taxonomists that we now build on and use to answer some of the present questions.
Numéro du document :	A/BIO
Niveau Bibliographique :	2
Bull1 (Theme principale) :	BIOLOGIE
Bull2 (Theme secondaire) :	BIOLOGIE GENERALE