The genus Grzegorzekia Edwards (Diptera: Mycetophilidae) revisited: molecular phylogeny and description of four new species

  • Olavi Kurina Institute of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, Estonian University of Life Sciences, Kreutzwaldi St. 5, 51006 Tartu, Estonia https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4858-4629
  • Nikola Burdíková Department of Biology and Ecology, Faculty of Science, University of Ostrava, Chittussiho 10, CZ-710 00 Ostrava, Czech Republic https://orcid.org/0009-0009-0735-4411
  • David Kaspřák Department of Biology and Ecology, Faculty of Science, University of Ostrava, Chittussiho 10, CZ-710 00 Ostrava, Czech Republic
  • Jostein Kjærandsen The Arctic University Museum of Norway, UiT – The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3104-073X
  • Jan Ševčík Department of Biology and Ecology, Faculty of Science, University of Ostrava, Chittussiho 10, CZ-710 00 Ostrava, Czech Republic https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7174-593X
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5852/ejt.2026.1106.3338
Keywords: Sciaroidea, Mycetophilidae, Grzegorzekia, male terminalia, DNA barcoding, key to species

Abstract

The genus Grzegorzekia Edwards, 1941 (Diptera: Mycetophilidae: Gnoristinae) is revised based on newly assembled material from Europe, the Nearctic, and the Oriental region, complemented by molecular data (COI, 16S, 28S). Four new species are described and illustrated: Grzegorzekia pseudocollaris Kurina, Ševčík & Kjaerandsen sp. nov. (Czech Republic, Slovakia, Italy), G. bruneiensis Kurina & Ševčík sp. nov. (Brunei Darussalam), G. taiwanica Kurina & Ševčík sp. nov. (Taiwan), and G. canadensis Kurina & Kjaerandsen sp. nov. (Canada: British Columbia, Alberta). All previously known European species are re-illustrated for comparison, and a revised key to the world species is provided. Diagnostic characters of the genus are confirmed, including the secondary loss of the male gonostylus and the presence of complex, bipartite gonocoxites bearing posterior combs of spines. Molecular data largely corroborate morphospecies boundaries, although G. canadensis comprises two COI BINs with low divergence (2.12%), and G. taiwanica shows pronounced COI divergence despite minimal variation in 16S and 28S. With these additions, Grzegorzekia now comprises nine described species distributed across the Holarctic and Oriental regions. New country records are provided for G. hungarica Papp & Ševčík, 2007 and G. bushyae Chandler, 2015.

References

Åström J. & Davey M. 2025. National insect monitoring in Norway. Version 1.13. Norwegian Institute for Nature Research. Sampling event dataset. Available from https://doi.org/10.15468/2jwnc6 [accessed 3 Feb. 2026].

Chandler P.J. 1980. The European and eastern Nearctic fungus‑gnats in the genus Ectrepesthoneura (Mycetophilidae). Systematic Entomology 5: 27–41. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-3113.1980.tb00395.x

Chandler P.J. 1999. Creagdhubhia mallochorum gen. and sp. n. (Diptera: Mycetophilidae), a remarkable new Scottish gnat with a discussion of its relationships. British Journal of Entomology and Natural History 12: 121–134.

Chandler P.J. 2015. A new species of Grzegorzekia Edwards (Diptera: Mycetophilidae) from England and France. Entomologist’s Gazette 66: 53–60.

Chandler P.J. 2020. Fungus gnats recording scheme newsletter 11 spring 2020. Bulletin of the Dipterists Forum 89: 1–8.

De Jong Y., Verbeek M., Michelsen V., Bjørn P.P., Los W., Steeman F., Bailly N., Basire C., Chylarecki P., Stloukal E., Hagedorn G., Wetzel F.T., Glöckler F., Kroupa A., Korb G., Hoffmann A., Häuser C., Kohlbecker A., Müller A., ... & Penev L. 2014. Fauna Europaea – all European animal species on the web. Biodiversity Data Journal 2: e4034. https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.2.e4034

Edwards F.W. 1941. Notes on British fungus-gnats (Dipt., Mycetophilidae). The Entomologist’s Monthly Magazine 77: 21–32, 67–82.

Fitzgerald S.J. 2019. The Nearctic species of Grzegorzekia Edwards (Diptera: Mycetophilidae). Zootaxa 4623 (3): 163–174. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.4623.1.11

Hall T.A. 1999. BioEdit: A user-friendly biological sequence alignment editor and analysis program for Windows 95/98/NT. Nucleic Acids Symposium Series 41: 95–98.

Hoang D.T., Chernomor O., von Haeseler A., Minh B.Q. & Vinh L.S. 2017. UFBoot2: Improving the ultrafast bootstrap approximation. Molecular Biology and Evolution 35: 512–522. https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msx281

Kaspřák D., Kerr P., Sýkora V., Tóthová A. & Ševčík J. 2019. Molecular phylogeny of the fungus gnat subfamilies Gnoristinae and Mycomyinae, and their position within Mycetophilidae (Diptera). Systematic Entomology 44: 128–138. https://doi.org/10.1111/syen.12312

Kjærandsen J., Jakovlev J., Polevoi A., Salmela J. & Kurina O. 2022. A rarely seen taxonomic revision with immense value for 41 years and counting: reflections on the 1981 monograph of Trichonta Winnertz, 1864 (Diptera, Mycetophilidae) by Raymond Gagné, with an integrative revision of the Trichonta vulcani (Dziedzicki, 1889) species complex. Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington 124 (3): 416–458. https://doi.org/10.4289/0013-8797.124.3.416

Kück P. & Longo G.C. 2014. FASconCAT-G: extensive functions for multiple sequence alignment preparations concerning phylogenetic studies. Frontiers in Zoology 11 (1): 1–8. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12983-014-0081-x

Kurina O. 2021. A contribution towards checklist of fungus gnats (Diptera, Diadocidiidae, Ditomyiidae, Bolitophilidae, Keroplatidae, Mycetophilidae) in Georgia, Transcaucasia. ZooKeys 1026: 69–142. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1026.63749

Kurina O. & Grootaert P. 2023. Fungus gnats in the Botanic Garden Jean Massart: an amazing diversity beyond the naked eye (Diptera: Diadocidiidae, Ditomyiidae, Bolitophilidae, Keroplatidae, Mycetophilidae). Belgian Journal of Entomology 134: 39–66.

Kurina O., Manko P. & Oboňa J. 2024. Bibionomorph gnats (Diptera: Nematocera) collected from Lažany village, Slovakia. Acta Musei Silesiae, Scientiae Naturales 73: 195–207. https://doi.org/10.2478/cszma-2024-0011

Letunic I. & Bork P. 2024. Interactive Tree of Life (iTOL) v6: recent updates to the phylogenetic tree display and annotation tool. Nucleic Acids Research 52: 78–82. https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkae268

Mantič M., Sikora T., Roháček J. & Ševčík J. 2015. New and interesting records of Bibionomorpha (Diptera) from the Czech and Slovak Republics. Acta Musei Silesiae, Scientiae Naturales 64: 141–149. https://doi.org/10.1515/cszma-2015-0020

Meigen J.W. 1818. Systematische Beschreibung der bekannten europäischen zweiflügeligen Insekten (Vol. 1). F.W. Forstmann, Aachen (Germany). Available from https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/13917274 [accessed 3 Feb. 2026].

Nguyen L.T., Schmidt H.A., von Haeseler A. & Minh B.Q. 2015. IQ-TREE: A fast and effective stochastic algorithm for estimating maximum likelihood phylogenies. Molecular Biology and Evolution 32: 268–274. https://doi.org/10.1093/molbev/msu300

Papp L. & Ševčík J. 2007. Grzegorzekia hungarica sp. n. and new records of European Mycetophilidae and Bolitophilidae (Diptera). Acta Zoologica Universitatis Comenianae 47 (2): 187–193.

Søli G.E.E. 1997. The adult morphology of Mycetophilidae (s.str.), with a tentative phylogeny of the family (Diptera, Sciaroidea). Entomologica Scandinavica Supplement 50: 5–55.

Søli G.E.E. 2017. 20. Mycetophilidae (fungus gnats). In: Kirk‑Spriggs A.H. & Sinclair B.J. (eds) Manual of Afrotropical Diptera. Vol. 2. Nematocera & Lower Brachycera: 533–555. SANBI Publishing, Pretoria.

Steenwyk J.L., Buida T.J. III, Li Y., Shen X-X. & Rokas A. 2020. ClipKIT: a multiple sequence alignment trimming software for accurate phylogenomic inference. PLoS Biology 18 (12): e3001007. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3001007

Stucky B.J. 2012. SeqTrace: A graphical tool for rapidly processing DNA sequencing chromatograms. Journal of Biomolecular Techniques 23: 90–93. https://doi.org/10.7171/jbt.12-2303-004

Ševčík J. & Kurina O. 2011. Fungus gnats (Diptera: Sciaroidea) of the Gemer region (Central Slovakia): Part 2. Mycetophilidae. Časopis Slezského zemského muzea Opava (A) 60: 97–126.

Ševčík J., Hippa H., Burdíková N., Sopuch K., Skuhravá M. & Bruun H.H. 2023. Integrative taxonomy of Central European Planetella (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae) indicates high species diversity, intraspecific variation and low host specificity. Acta Entomologica Musei Nationalis Pragae 63 (2): 413–450. https://doi.org/10.37520/aemnp.2023.026

Väisänen R. 1984. A new Mediterranean species of Grzegorzekia (Diptera, Mycetophilidae). Annales Entomologici Fennici 50: 55–57.

Winnertz J. 1864. Beitrag zu einer Monographie der Pilzmücken. Verhandlungen der Zoologisch-Botanischen Gesellschaft in Wien 13: 637–964. https://doi.org/10.5962/bhl.title.9961

Published
2026-10-09
How to Cite
Kurina, O., Burdíková, N., Kaspřák, D., Kjærandsen, J., & Ševčík, J. (2026). The genus Grzegorzekia Edwards (Diptera: Mycetophilidae) revisited: molecular phylogeny and description of four new species. European Journal of Taxonomy, 1106(1), 1–42. https://doi.org/10.5852/ejt.2026.1106.3338
Issue
Vol. 1106 (2026)
Section
Research article

Copyright (c) 2026 Olavi Kurina, Nikola Burdíková, David Kaspřák, Jostein Kjærandsen, Jan Ševčík

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Creative Commons Copyright Notices

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

  1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0) that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
  2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
  3. Authors are NOT PERMITTED to post their submitted work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on personal websites) prior to publication, as it may lead to nomenclatural issues.