Discovery of the largest orbweaving spider species: the evolution of gigantism in Nephila.
BACKGROUND
More than 41,000 spider species are known with about 400-500 added each year, but for some well-known groups, such as the giant golden orbweavers, Nephila, the last valid described species dates from the 19(th) century. Nephila are renowned for being the largest web-spinning spiders, making the largest orb webs, and are model organisms for the study of extreme sexual size dimorphism (SSD) and sexual biology. Here, we report on the discovery of a new, giant Nephila species from Africa and Madagascar, and review size evolution and SSD in Nephilidae.


METHODS
We formally describe N. komaci sp. nov., the largest web spinning species known, and place the species in phylogenetic context to reconstruct the evolution of mean size (via squared change parsimony). We then test female and male mean size correlation using phylogenetically independent contrasts, and simulate nephilid body size evolution using Monte Carlo statistics.


CONCLUSIONS
Nephila females increased in size almost monotonically to establish a mostly African clade of true giants. In contrast, Nephila male size is effectively decoupled and hovers around values roughly one fifth of female size. Although N. komaci females are the largest Nephila yet discovered, the males are also large and thus their SSD is not exceptional.
Institute of Biology, Scientific Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Ljubljana, Slovenia. kuntner@gmail.com
Matjaz
M
Kuntner
Jonathan A
JA
Coddington
D000349:Africa; D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D049628:Body Size; D005260:Female; D008270:Madagascar; D008297:Male; D009010:Monte Carlo Method; D010802:Phylogeny; D012737:Sex Factors; D013045:Species Specificity; D013112:Spiders / Q000235:genetics* / Q000502:physiology*