Bees comprise more than 20,000 described species in seven families and are found on all continents except Antarctica, but where did they originate? And when did they originate?
Cornell University alumnus Eduardo Almeida, an associate professor at the University of São Paulo, Brazil, will discuss “The Evolutionary History of Bees in Time and Space” at a seminar hosted by the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology on Monday, April 8.
The seminar begins at 4:10 p.m. in 122 Briggs Hall, and also will be on Zoom. The Zoom link:
https://ucdavis.zoom.us/j/95882849672
"Bees likely originated in the Early Cretaceous (120 million years ago), shortly before the breakup of Western Gondwana (Africa and South America), and the early evolution of any major bee lineage is associated with either the South American or African land masses," Almeida says in his abstract.
"I will present the results of an investigation on bee biogeograpy using extensive new genomic and fossil data to demonstrate that bees originated in Western Gondwana. Bees later colonized northern continents via a complex history of vicariance and dispersal. The notable early absences of these insects from large landmasses, particularly in Australia and India, have important implications for understanding the assembly of local floras and diverse modes of pollination. The partnership between flowering plants and bees began in the Cretaceous, and the history of how bees spread around the world from their hypothesized southern hemisphere origin parallels the histories of numerous plant clades."
Almeida, who joined the University of São Paulo in 2011, conducts research on bee evolution, and is particularly interested in phylogenomics, comparative morphology, biogeography, and associations with host plants.
A native of Brazil, he received his doctorate in 2007 from Cornell University, where he studied with major professor Bryan Danforth. Almedia's focus: the biogeographic history of colletid bees. Prior to enrolling in the doctoral program at Cornell, he obtained his bachelor of science degree (biology) and his master's degree (ecology) from the Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Brazil. He speaks Portuguese, English, Spanish and French.
Almeida and his colleagues published a research paper in August 2023 in the journal, Current Biology, on "The Evolutionary History of Bees in Time and Space."
The summary: "Bees are the most significant pollinators of flowering plants. This partnership began ca. 120 million years ago, but the uncertainty of how and when bees spread across the planet has greatly obscured investigations of this key mutualism. We present a novel analysis of bee biogeography using extensive new genomic and fossil data to demonstrate that bees originated in Western Gondwana (Africa and South America). Bees likely originated in the Early Cretaceous, shortly before the breakup of Western Gondwana, and the early evolution of any major bee lineage is associated with either the South American or African land masses. Subsequently, bees colonized northern continents via a complex history of vicariance and dispersal. The notable early absences from large landmasses, particularly in Australia and India, have important implications for understanding the assembly of local floras and diverse modes of pollination. How bees spread around the world from their hypothesized Southern Hemisphere origin parallels the histories of numerous flowering plant clades, providing an essential step to studying the evolution of angiosperm pollination syndromes in space and time."
Coordinating the department's spring seminars is associate professor Brian Johnson. For any technical Zoom issues, he may be reached at brnjohnson@ucdavis.edu.
The complete list of spring quarter seminars is here.