Proceedings of the 5th International Symposium on the Chrysomelidae,
25-27 August 2000, Iguassu Falls, Brazil—21st International Congress of Entomology

David G. Furth, Editor
Pensoft Publishers, Sofia, Bulgaria
2003, xii+339 pages
Price: 65 Euro/USD
ISBN: 954-642-170-7 (hardback)

Writing about Chrysomelidae is writing about diversity. The term “leaf beetle” is a simple concept that agglutinates one of the largest higher taxonomic ranks within the already massive order Coleoptera. This group, still of imprecise boundaries, is currently recognized to include about 35,000 species; but that number is expected to be twice this figure, with most species to be discovered in the tropics.

Already implicit in their common name is one of their most cohesive features: They are phytophagous beetles that feed generally on green parts of vascular plants. The impressive species richness of this successful evolutionary lineage of beetles and the tight relationships with their source of energy, the plants, have attracted and will continue to attract the attention of generations of entomologists interested in an inexhaustible source of basic and applied research topics. These range from the essential discovery and description of new taxa to the study of their systematic relationships, their interactions with their environment, the investigation of their control (they constitute some of the most economically important agricultural pests), and reciprocally, their use as bio-control agents of exotic weeds. Although everything is still to be discovered, a great deal of research and scientific finding has been done through the years by a particularly passionate and productive community of leaf beetle researchers.

For the past two decades, several initiatives have put together the research from diverse scientific approaches with the Chrysomelidae as the only common theme. One of these actions successfully maintained through this period of time is the celebration, every four years and coincident with the International Congress of Entomology, of the International Symposium on the Chrysomelidae. These symposia, which were initiated in Hamburg (Germany) in 1985 and continued regularly through the meeting in Iguassu Falls (Brazil) in 2000, have gathered many specialists in the different areas of “Chrysomelidology,” making public the results of the last advances and new trends in the investigation of leaf beetles.

This book is the compilation of most of the research topics communicated and discussed in the last International Symposium on the Chrysomelidae, held in Iguassu Falls. It includes 22 chapters of independent research or review articles and five abstracts.
In a way, contents of this book shows the state-of-the-art in the study of leaf beetle biology, representing many of the current scientific appetites and curiosities that keep this field alive and healthy. These issues still revolve around the old central elements of biodiversity and trophic relationships, but because they are stable cores of scientific inspiration, the strategies used to target their study keep changing and up to date with the new ideas and analytical approaches in biological research.

Several chapters in this book deal with the study of biodiversity per se. These cover the study of communities and monitoring of biodiversity in tropical environments, providing methodological hints for future research in this field (Chapters 1 and 2; Abstract 1), and also species accounts in other areas with different degrees of entomological prospecting (Chapters 3 and 4).

The other related topic developed throughout the book is systematics. There are several good examples of the variety of strategies used to tackle taxonomic and phylogenetic problems in leaf beetles. Morphoanatomical studies continue to be the fundamental source of taxonomic knowledge for the higher classification of the Chrysomelidae sensu lato (Chapter 5), supra-specific systematic arrangements (Chapter 7) and the recognition and characterization of leaf beetle diversity (Chapter 8; Abstracts 2 and 3). But other approaches have been successfully implemented to the study of leaf beetle systematics; for example, the presence/absence analysis of specific groups of toxins (Chapter 18; Abstract 4) or the phylogenetic analyses based on the study of nucleic acid sequences (Chapters 6 and 11; Abstract 5). Infra-specific differentiation and the study of genetic diversity patterns related to geographic distribution, with important implication for conservation programs, are also important targets of leaf beetle research (Chapter 21).

Trophic relationships in the Chrysomelidae are explored in these “Special Topics” from many different perspectives. Leaf beetle collectors and researchers understand the importance of knowing about the host plants in which particular beetles can be found, and at least a basic botanical knowledge is usually acquired when investigating Chrysomelidae. Botanical links are frequent in leaf beetle literature, based on very methodic fieldwork and patient observations in the wild (Chapters 9, 12, and 14). But it is important to complement these data with controlled experiments in the laboratory, which will have confirmatory value and provide useful information such as niche width or life cycle and performance data (Chapter 13). A last step in the analysis of trophic relationships consists of looking at them on an evolutionary scale, which will help address questions about the diversification of the beetles themselves (Chapter 11).

Other interesting ecological studies included in this book, sometimes inevitably reporting details of trophic relationships for the studied Chrysomelidae, have focused on such diverse aspects as predator–prey (Chapter 10) or host–parasite (Chapters 16 and 17) interactions, description of life cycles, and population dynamics (Chapters 15, 19, and 20).

The last chapter in the book (Chapter 22) is a documented reflection about leaf beetles that have managed to exploit aquatic habitats in one way or another. This contribution is a result of numerous personal observations and an exhaustive literature survey by P. Jolivet, a predominant figure in the leaf beetle researchers’ community, to whom the symposium and its proceedings were dedicated.

The book is the result of a repeat editorial and publishing effort by David G. Furth and Pensoft Publishers (who previously teamed up in the publication of the 4th International Symposium on the Chrysomelidae), which is a guarantee of scientific and editorial quality. David Furth has been the enthusiastic mind and coordinator, solitary or in collaboration, behind each of the five volumes published so far with the Proceedings of the Chrysomelidae Symposia. His experience and criteria in coordinating and organizing the publication of varied sources of scientific contributions are beyond suspicion. Pensoft Publishers contributed to this project with a brief (less than one decade) but extremely efficient and intense experience in publishing natural history and science books with an international scope.

Overall, Special Topics in Leaf Beetle Biology is a book that needs to be read by all researchers wanting to stay informed on some of the latest research done on a fascinating zoological group, as well as by those interested in any of the specific topics developed in its pages.

Jesús Gómez-Zurita
Área de Biología Animal
Departamento de Zoología y Antropología Física
Facultad de Biología
Universidad de Murcia
30071 Murcia – Spain