Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County

Crustacea Section

Arthropod Diversity and Evolution

Arthropod Projects

Below is a smorgasbord of themes which you can use as a possible starting point for your oral presentations and webpages. Arthropod Projects will culminate in student-prepared, scientifically accurate, tabloid newspaper-style webpages. Visit the Resource Page for links to possible resources.

 
Reproduction

aphids (parthenogensis)
barnacles (longest penes in the animal world)
pheromones and other attractants
food offerings (mating, male then offers self as food reward to female)
competition (combat structures), also sperm competition
firefly sexual courtships displays (fireflies are actually beetles and not flies; also ostracods, marine equivalent to fireflies)

 
Parasitism

rhizocephalan barnacles
parasitic wasps
bot flies
isopod fish tongue parasite

 
Mutualism

cleaner shrimp

 
Herbivory

insect herbivory driving plant evolution
impact on human food production

 
Life History

locust periodicity
diapause
diversity of life (developmental) stages
biological clocks, Drosophila (=fruit-fly, arthropod model organism), what have we learned about them, what are the possible implications for how biological clocks might work in other organisms

 
Defense

ants and Acacia
leafcutter ants and fungal farming
cryptic coloration (eye spots on moth wings, translucent butterfly wings)
distastefulness
cryptic morphology (stick insects)
warning mimicry

 
Vision

compound eyes
diversity of eyes (spider vision, naupliar eyes, blind species)

 
Diversity of arthropods

spectacular diversity of insects in tropical forests
incredible beetle diversity ("an inordinate fondness for beetles")
crustacean diversity in deepsea
trilobite diversity -- incredibly successful group now extinct

 
Molting

how are millipedes related to crustaceans, spiders, and insects
why do we think that

 
Astonishing failure of insects to invade water

not enough time?
evolutionary one-way street?
lack of massive freshwater and terrestrial crustacean invasions

 
Arthropod products

as food
caterpillar silk
spider silk

 
Locomotion

flight = lift-based propulsion
"swimming" in dragonflies vs. flight in thrips
importance of Reynold's number, body size, scale

 
Human and pet health

arthropod vectors for diseases, malaria, thyphoid fever
nature's pharmacological store - drugs from arthropods
ectoparasites: mites, fleas, ticks, lice, and others

 
Fossils

extinct classes (trilobites, eurypterans)
"living fossils"

 
Phylogenetics

arthropods and related groups: tardigrades (water bears), small, cute, and cuddly; onychophorans (velvet worms); sea spiders (pycnogonids)
hot topics in arthropod evolution
are insects flying crustaceans?