Rapid adaptive radiation and host plant conservation in the Hawaiian picture wing Drosophila (Diptera: Drosophilidae)

[Display omitted] •We recovered a well resolved phylogeny of the Hawaiian picture wing Drosophila.•Major splits in the group are much more recent than previously thought.•Host plant usage is conserved, with little change over the past 2million years.•Relationships of unusual species have been obscured by rapid morphological change.•Presence of relictual species and clades suggests extinction has shaped the extant fauna. The Hawaiian picture wing Drosophila are a striking example of adaptive radiation in specialist saprophages on an island system. We use DNA sequences from five nuclear genes with a total of 4260 nucleotides to provide a comprehensive phylogeny and biogeographic analysis of 90 species in the Hawaiian Drosophila picture wing clade. The current analysis indicates that the evolution of the picture wing clade took place more recently than previously suggested. The relationships of several morphologically anomalous taxa are resolved with strong support. Biogeography and host plant analyses show two periods of rapid divergence occurred when Kauai and Oahu were the main high islands, indicating that a combination of complex topographical features of islands and development of novel host plant associations was key to the rapid diversification of these lineages. For the past 2million years, host associations within lineages have been largely stable, and speciation has occurred primarily due to the establishment of populations on newer islands as they arose followed by divergence by isolation. The existence of several apparently relictual taxa suggests that extinction has also played a major role in assembly of the present Hawaiian Drosophila fauna.