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| Archaboilus musicus Gu, Engel & Ren, 2012 in Xu, Wang, Wappler, Chen, ... et Engel, 2022. |
Significance:
Extinct animals usually had complex acoustic behavior, but fossils reveal little of these details. Here, we report the earliest insect ears and sound-producing system found in Mesozoic katydids. These katydids evolved unexpectedly high acoustic diversity. Our analysis shows that katydids are the earliest known animals to have evolved complex acoustic communication, acoustic niche partitioning, and high-frequency musical calls. Our results not only suggest that acoustic communication might have been an important driver for the early radiation of katydids but also support the hypothesis of the acoustic coevolution of mammals and katydids. These findings unveil acoustic behavioral complexity and evolutionary adaption amongst Mesozoic katydids and contribute to understanding the evolution of Mesozoic soundscape thus far mostly inaccessible from the paleontological record.
Abstract
Acoustic communication has played a key role in the evolution of a wide variety of vertebrates and insects. However, the reconstruction of ancient acoustic signals is challenging due to the extreme rarity of fossilized organs. Here, we report the earliest tympanal ears and sound-producing system (stridulatory apparatus) found in exceptionally preserved Mesozoic katydids. We present a database of the stridulatory apparatus and wing morphology of Mesozoic katydids and further calculate their probable singing frequencies and analyze the evolution of their acoustic communication. Our suite of analyses demonstrates that katydids evolved complex acoustic communication including mating signals, intermale communication, and directional hearing, at least by the Middle Jurassic. Additionally, katydids evolved a high diversity of singing frequencies including high-frequency musical calls, accompanied by acoustic niche partitioning at least by the Late Triassic, suggesting that acoustic communication might have been an important driver in the early radiation of these insects. The Early—Middle Jurassic katydid transition from Haglidae- to Prophalangopsidae-dominated faunas coincided with the diversification of derived mammalian clades and improvement of hearing in early mammals, supporting the hypothesis of the acoustic coevolution of mammals and katydids. Our findings not only highlight the ecological significance of insects in the Mesozoic soundscape but also contribute to our understanding of how acoustic communication has influenced animal evolution.
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| Ecological restoration of singing katydids from the Middle Jurassic Daohugou Konservat-Lagerstätte of China. Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences: NIGPAS |
Chunpeng Xu, Bo Wang, Torsten Wappler, Jun Chen, Dmitry Kopylov, Yan Fang, Edmund A. Jarzembowski, Haichun Zhang and Michael S. Engel. 2022. High Acoustic Diversity and Behavioral Complexity of Katydids in the Mesozoic Soundscape. PNAS. 119 (51) e2210601119
phys.org/news/2022-12-fossil-katydids-insights-evolution-mesozoic.html
