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Plant - insect interactions in lower Miocene of Central Europe: palaeoclimatological and palaeoecological implications
Knor, Stanislav ; Prokop, Jakub (advisor) ; Kvaček, Jiří (referee) ; Mikuláš, Radek (referee)
The paleoecology of plant - arthropod herbivory associations constitute very important source of knowledge about the phylogeny and co-evolution of both groups. The traces of herbivory interactions between plants and arthropods on the fossil leaves are preserved as so called damaged types (DTs) clustered into distinct functional feeding groups (FFGs). The diversity and frequency of these damage traces also seem to have been strongly influenced by environmental and climatic conditions. This research has been focused on rich fossil plant assemblages from the area of the Most Basin in the north-western Bohemia. The undergoing work has comprised the diagnosis of the individual damages on the basis of their specific morphological traits as their number, size, shape and distributional pattern on the leaf surface. The next issue has involved the statistical analyses concerning the differences in the frequency and diversity of the types of damage and functional feeding groups between two separate fossiliferous layers, namely those of the stratigraphically older Bílina Delta and younger Břešťany Clay. Significant differences were confirmed in this regard, especially in connection with achieved frequency and proportional occurrences of distinct functional feeding groups in the Bílina Delta. The galls were the...
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Variation in dragonfly wing venation with application of geometric morphometrics (Insecta: Odonata)
Přibylová, Petra ; Prokop, Jakub (advisor) ; Růžička, Jan (referee)
The pattern of wing venation in dragonflies (Odonata) bears a set of characters commonly used in systematics. The aim of this thesis is to identify the wing venation variability of dragonflies by various methods of geometric morphometric. The wing venation variability was examined on the level of suborder, family, species and also in respect to dimorphism through the principal component analysis (PCA), redundancy analysis (RDA) and centroid size. Data set consisting of images of 46 dragonfly species, belonging to 43 genera and 24 families was obtained from institutional entomological collections. The research carried out that Zygoptera have a large variety of wing contours. The wing venation variability of Epiprocta is shown primarily in the costa and node area. Between sexes there is no noticeable difference in shape or structure of the wing. The ratio between wing length and width and the pterostigma shape is dependent on dragonfly body size. Key words: Odonatoptera, Odonata, Epiprocta, Zygoptera, wing venation, variability, geometric morphometrics
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Palaeodictyoptera: morphology of immature wings from the Upper Carboniferous of Poland
Tippeltová, Zuzana ; Prokop, Jakub (advisor) ; Nel, Andre (referee)
Insect wings are very specific and unique structures in animal kingdom. Wing morphology is a result of long-standing complicated evolutionary process and until recently the way how the wings have evolved is not completely clarified. The flight ability is one of the most important event in insect history because it allows them to exploit new habitats, escape from predators or find the sexual partner. Here we present the newly discovered material consisting of Palaeodictyoptera immature wings from the Upper Carboniferous (Westphalian A) of Poland. This order became extinct in the end of Permian, however during the Late Paleozoic was remarkably diversified. Until recently, number of adult palaeodictyopterans have been described, however the immature stages are relatively unknown due to lack of suitable fossils. Immature wings present in this thesis have undoubtedly palaeodictyopterous affinities with atribution within superfamilies Breyeroidea and Homoiopteroidea. However, their familial assignment into Breyeriidae (morphotype A) and Homiopteridae (morphotype B) based on fore wing venation characters is not definite because of wing venation limits in early ontogenetic stages. The aim of the present work is a complex description of 14 new palaeodictyopteriids immature wings, and to point out certain important...
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Megasecoptera: morphology and taxonomy of newly discovered specimens from Upper Carboniferous of northern China (Insecta: Palaeodictyopteroida)
Pecharová, Martina ; Prokop, Jakub (advisor) ; Godunko, Roman (referee)
The extinct insect group of Palaeodictyopteroida (Insecta: Palaeoptera) comprised mainly phytophagous species and occurred from Upper Carboniferous to Upper Permian. Megasecoptera is one of several orders of belonging to this group. Although, the order Megasecoptera comprised over 20 described families, morphology of some body structures are insufficiently studied. The present thesis deals with evaluation of new material comprising the extensive set of 76 fossil insect specimens from the Upper Carboniferous (Bashkirian) of northern China. The fossils having excellent state of preservation of the wings and other body structures provide new insights concerning the external morphology of Megasecoptera. All studied specimens were attributed based on wing venation pattern into two known megasecopteran genera within families Brodiopteridae and Sphecopteridae. The aim of the present thesis is examine the morphology and variability of wing venation of two newly proposed species Brodioptera sp. n. and Cyclocelis sp. n. from site in northern China. In addition the following methods of geometric morphometrics based on landmarks were used for comparison of venational characters: a comparison of centroid size, procrustes analysis, principal component analysis and thin plate spline. Variability of wing venation...
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Design and functional morphology of insect wings
Jechová, Kateřina ; Prokop, Jakub (advisor) ; Janšta, Petr (referee)
Animal fly ability is undoubtedly one of the biggest innovation in evolution that allow animals to settle down another space on the Earth - the air. However, there are significant impacts on the other organisms during the evolution, too. The insect is single group of invertebrates with abilities to fly and because of that it became the most diversified group of organisms. There are a couple of theories about origin of the insect wings. Two major hypotheses considering the recent insects with their fossil record are widely known. Nevertheless, there is no direct clue to the first Pterygota due to the discontinuity of fossil record in the initial phase of their evolution The wing is very complex and unique structure throughout organisms. Insects became very good fliers during the evolution and wings are also used to protect of the body, carrying sensory organs, etc. Nevertheless, only very few insect species are well explored in term of flight and, an open theme for future studies. Aim of the present work is to describe the significance of the wing and to briefly review its morphological and design properties. Key words: Insecta, Pterygota, wing, venation, morphology, flight, evolution.
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Gigantism of Paleozoic insects and other arthropods
Pecharová, Martina ; Prokop, Jakub (advisor) ; Knor, Stanislav (referee)
Gigantism of insects and other arthropods was rather common in Late Paleozoic. Hypothesis of the oxygen limitation is one the probable explanations caused the phenomenon. Carboniferous insect gigantism was probably directly caused by the higher level of atmospheric oxygen due to direct effectiveness on the tracheal system. Therefore the possibility to grow to large sizes is clearly dependent on the amount of available oxygen. Another fact supporting the hypothesis is the extinction or the change of the giant insect forms at the end of the Permian, when the level of atmospheric oxygen suddenly decreased. This thesis also describes the ecological relationships of the Late Paleozoic arthropods, which is clearly connected to the evolution of giant forms. Gigantism during this period was thus developed by the interplay of several factors related to the global elements cycles. Another part covers major groups and representatives of Palaeozoic gigantic insects and other arthropods. The final part is devoted to describing the physiological experiments related to this topic.
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Vodomilovití brouci (Coleoptera: Hydrophiloidea): taxomomie, fylogeneze a fosilní záznam vybraných skupin
Fikáček, Martin ; Prokop, Jakub (advisor) ; Engel, Michael (referee) ; Balke, Michael (referee)
The presented PhD thesis consists of two parts. The first part concerns the fos- sil record of the hydrophiloid beetles. Its introductory chapter summarizes the current author's knowledge of the topic, based on the review of all available literature and his published and unpublished data. Historical review is provided, problems concerning the study of the hydrophiloid fossil taxa and the relevance of the fossil record are discussed. Two published papers and two manuscripts concerning the systematics and taxonomy of selected hydrophilid beetles from European Cenozoic deposits are attached. As a part of these results, the diver- sification of the greater hydrophilines lineage of the subtribe Hydrophilina is dated back to the middle Eocene and the occurrence of the currently tropical ge- nus Hydrobiomorpha in Europe is proved from Eocene to the latest Oligocene. The first fossil of the genus Limnoxenus (subtribe Hydrobiusina) is recorded from the late Oligocene locality of Aix-en-Provence, its taxonomic placement is tested by the phylogenetic analysis combining modern and fossil taxa and its relevance is discussed. The second part concerns selected taxa of the terrestrial hydrophilids of the subfamily Sphaeridiinae. Its introductory chapter briefly summarizes the...
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Palaeocology of plant-arthropod associations from the Lower Miocene of the Most Basin in northern Bohemia (Czech Republic)
Knor, Stanislav ; Prokop, Jakub (advisor) ; Teodoridis, Vasilis (referee)
Terrestrial plants and insects account for the majority of the Earth's biodiversity today, and almost half of all insect species are herbivores. Thus, insects and plants share ancient associations date back for more than 400 million years. However, investigation of their interactions stands largely at the beginning in Western Europe. Nearly 4300 plant remains showing various kinds of feeding damages are available for the present study. These trace fossils are classified as so-called functional feeding-groups supply an outstanding example of the complexity, the structure and the changes of terrestrial ecosystems, are not well known during this interval. In Europe, the Neogene is characterized by palaeogeographic re- organization due to the collision of the African with the Eurasian plates. The Neogene plant record in Europe is rich and diverse offering a profound large-scale understanding of the floristic and vegetational development. A database of fossil traces from the Most Basin was compiled and analyzed by various statistical methods in terms of the diversity and intensity of palaeo-herbivory. The primary objective is to present results on the development of insect herbivory through the section of the Bílina Mine in North Bohemia, with the aim of understanding principal factors that caused the...
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Možnosti uplatnění netradičních surovin při výrobě chleba a pečiva
Prokop, Jakub
The bechelor thesis deals with production of bread and pastry, listing less common raw materials used for production and introducing practical experiment consist producing pastry with less common raw material. Production of bread and pastry is described from basic flour production as main ingredient, through dough preparation, mixing, resting, shaping products, proofing, ba-king a finaly cooling. Follow by list of raw materials moreless common for bread and pastry production, describing nutritional and bakery characteristics and effect on produ-cts quality. Last part describes methods of preparation pastry with malt, baker experi-ment and sensoric analysis results evaluation.
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