Thread subject: Diptera.info :: Eyes of Chaoborus larva

Posted by Nikita Vikhrev on 03-10-2019 14:54
#5

Tony, to tell the truth, your perly is exactly what I was hoping for. Thank you! I’m writing a small popular paper about Chaoborus and it is why I found this question. I asked several colleagues, but no one thought about this contradiction. Finally I came to the same conclusions as you:
- imaginal compound eyes are visible on glassworm head because the worm is glassware;
- does glassworm uses these eyes or not – is another question (I did not find any investigation concerning that).
By the way, I had one more doubt on “complex catching basket built of head appendages” (Kruppert et al. (2019) Zooplankters’ nightmare: The fast and efficient catching basket of larval phantom midges (Diptera: Chaoborus). PloS ONE, 14(3): e0214013). Is it modified antenna or something else? In most dipteran larvae there is no antenna. But I found that in related Culicidae larvae also have well developed antenna, so Chaoborid’s catching basket should really be modified antenna.