A NEW species of insect may have arisen in an evolutionary blink of an eye as a result of cross-species mating. The discovery suggests that hybridisation – an important force in producing new species in plants – may also be widespread in animals. Until now, it had been assumed that new animal species almost always arise by gradually splitting off from an existing lineage.
The probable new species belongs to a group of flies known as fruit maggots, highly specialised fruit parasites of which each species infests one particular plant species. In 1997, Bruce McPheron and his colleagues at Pennsylvania State University…
