Recently, the Community Ecology Lab received the highest honor possible. Since January 2022, the laboratory has had a species of Oocyclus (Coleoptera: Hydrophilidae) in his honor. This gift comes from the phenomenal work of Janderson Batista R. Alencar et al. in volume 5087 of Zootaxa. In the authors' words, "The specific epithet ecolab is derived from the acronym of the Community Ecology Lab of the Universidade Federal do Amazonas, in Brazil. It is a tribute to all the support received for the development of this work. To be treated as a noun in apposition." One of the main objectives of the laboratory is to offer a healthy and stimulating environment for developing research projects and, mainly, for training new professionals. We are very proud of this honor!!

 

The biology of this genus is not well known, probably due to its habitat and size. All species described so far are hygropetric and usually smaller than 2 mm. Hygropetric habitats are found near waterfalls or rocky bottom rivers on constant water. To learn more about this and the other eight (!) new species described by Janderson and collaborators, see the PDF.