A new species, Somatochlora shennong sp. nov. (holotype ♂, Dajiuhu National Wetland Park in Shennongjia National Nature Reserve, Hubei Province, China, 9 August 2012) is described, illustrated, and compared with the related species S. dido Needham and S. taiwana Inoue & Yokota. 

Unusual biogeographic patterns of closely related groups reflect events in the past, and molecular analyses can help to elucidate these events. While ample research on the origin of disjunct distributions of different organism groups in the Western Paleartic has been conducted, such studies are rare for Eastern Palearctic organisms. In this paper we present a phylogeographic analysis of the dis...

The implications of insectsÕ vision for territorial defense have been relatively little studied in the Þeld. In the dragonßy Perithemis tenera Say we investigated whether either the angle at which an intruder was viewed by a territorial resident or the background against which it was viewed affected the detection of that intruder. Residents detected intruders at a greater distance if the intrud...

Three new species of Peristicta Hagen in Selys from Brazil are described and illustrated: P. janiceae from Minas Gerais State (Diamantina, Gouvêa, Lagoa Santa, Serra do Caraça, Serra do Cipó, Urobotanga), P. jalmosi from Goiás State (Chapada dos Veadeiros, Reserva da Universidade de Brasília) and Minas Gerais State (Urobotanga, Lagoa Santa, Ponte Nova, São João del Rey,) and P. muzoni from Mato...

A commented list of fossil Odonata from the Oligocene outcrop of Rott is given, together with descriptions of new traces of oviposition in plant tissues, very similar to ichnotaxa already known from the early Eocene Laguna del Hunco floras of Patagonia. The joint presences of odonatan larvae and traces of oviposition demonstrate the autochthony of these insects in the palaeolake of Rott, confir...

DNA barcoding has become a promising means for identifying organisms of all life stages. Currently, phenetic approaches and tree-building methods have been used to define species boundaries and discover 'cryptic species'. However, a universal threshold of genetic distance values to distinguish taxonomic groups cannot be determined. As an alternative, DNA barcoding approaches can be 'character b...

thirteen species in five genera of the libellulidae family were collected in a survey of dragonflies (odonata) of shiraz and its vicinity, involving 19 locations, the presented records of the libellulid dragonflies taken from the fars province comprise a first time collection of two genera, sympetrum and pantala, and seven species, orthetrum anceps schnider, orthetrum taeniolatum schneider, ort...

Weather extremes may have strong effects on biodiversity, as known from theoretical and modelling studies. Predicted negative effects of increased weather variation are found only for a few species, mostly plants and birds in empirical studies. Therefore, we investigated correlations between weather variability and patterns in occupancy, local colonisations and local extinctions (metapopulation...