Assessing the potential spread of Zaprionus tuberculatus (Diptera: Drosophilidae) in the Americas: insights for proactive management and agricultural protection.

Invasive species pose significant ecological and economic threats globally. Zaprionus tuberculatus Malloch, a drosophilid fruit fly native to the Afrotropical region and Indian Ocean islands, is included in the pest list of the Center for Agriculture and Bioscience (CABI) because it uses fruit as breeding sites and can damage cultivated areas. This fly species extended its range across Europe in the late 20th century; in 2020, it was recorded in South America, and currently, it is widely distributed in Brazil.

Thermal Stress and Adult Fitness in a Drosophila suzukii Neotropical Propagule.

Drosophila suzukii (Matsumura 1931) is a cosmopolitan horticultural pest originally from temperate East Asia; yet, its recent introduction in southeast and central Brazil raises the possibility it might expand into warmer climatic zones. In theoretical terms, the adaptive potential of invasive species can be impaired by the lack of genetic variation, but, on the other hand, phenotypic plasticity might play an important role in the adaptation to the new environment. In this context, we investigated the effects of temperature variation (18°C, 22°C, and 28°C) on fitness traits and size of male reproductive organs (accessory glands and testis) in a natural D.

Genetic variability and phenotypic plasticity of metric thoracic traits in an invasive drosophilid in America.

Thermal phenotypic plasticity of 5 metric thoracic traits (3 related to size and 2 to pigmentation) was investigated in Zaprionus indianus with an isofemale line design. Three of these traits are investigated for the first time in a drosophilid, i.e.

Cellular basis of morphological variation and temperature-related plasticity in Drosophila melanogaster strains with divergent wing shapes.

Organ shape evolves through cross-generational changes in developmental patterns at cellular and/or tissue levels that ultimately alter tissue dimensions and final adult proportions. Here, we investigated the cellular basis of an artificially selected divergence in the outline shape of Drosophila melanogaster wings, by comparing flies with elongated or rounded wing shapes but with remarkably similar wing sizes. We also tested whether cellular plasticity in response to developmental temperature was altered by such selection.

Variability of wing size and shape in three populations of a recent Brazilian invader, Zaprionus indianus (Diptera: Drosophilidae), from different habitats.

Zaprionus indianus (Diptera: Drosophilidae) is an African species that was introduced in Brazil near the end of the 1990's decade. To evaluate the adaptive potential of morphological traits in natural populations of this recently introduced species, we have investigated wing size and shape variation at Rio de Janeiro populations only two years after the first record of Z. indianus in Brazil.