[Syrphidae] request for help in a research project

[Justyna Kierat]

Dear All,

I'm forwarding a request for help from my colleague. If you could and would
like to help him, or have any questions about the project, feel free to
contact him directly at p.lukasik at uj.edu.pl

Best regards,
Justyna Kierat

Piotr Łukasik, a biologist at Jagiellonian University in Kraków, is
developing a broad comparative project on hoverfly-associated microbiota
across Europe and Greenland. The project examines within-species genetic
diversity of hoverflies, the abundance and diversity of their bacterial and
fungal associates, and the evolution and significance of associations with
Wolbachia and other common bacterial symbionts. His team is generating
amplicon-sequencing data from thousands of individual hoverflies, targeting
host COI barcodes as well as bacterial and fungal markers (16S and ITS).
Genomic analyses are planned for a substantial subset of host–Wolbachia
genotype combinations.
The team has a large hoverfly collection from Greenland, including
replicate individuals from more than 20 species sampled across multiple
populations and years, as well as smaller collections from Poland, Sweden,
the United Kingdom, and Iceland. They are now looking for additional
preserved hoverfly material—particularly larger collections with several
individuals per species and population, ideally spanning multiple
localities or seasons. Single specimens of taxonomically interesting or
rarely collected species would also be valuable.
The preferred material is specimens preserved in high-concentration ethanol
or another DNA-friendly preservative, or stored frozen (ideally at −80°C,
although −20°C can also be useful).
If you have suitable preserved material that you would be interested in
contributing, or know colleagues who might, please let Piotr know. They
would be happy to discuss available sampling metadata, potential
collaboration, and appropriate acknowledgement or co-authorship where
relevant.
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