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Microdon Unicolor
Hover flies (family Syrphidae) of the genus ''Microdon'' are unusual among the Diptera. Like other members of the subfamily, they are myrmecophiles, meaning they inhabit the nests of ants. There are 249 species known worldwide, with the greatest diversity being from the tropics; 30 species are known from North America, though it is expected that many of these species will be placed in other genera in time, as ''Microdon'' has been used as a catch-all for various unrelated species not placed in other genera. Appearance ''Microdon'' adults look more or less like typical flies. Like some other hoverflies, they are generally robust and very hairy, often closely resembling bees. They are between 8 and 15 mm long. The antennae are rather long, with the last (third) segment nearly as long as, or sometimes significantly longer than, the first segment; the antennae are nearly as long as the fly's face. These flies are covered in black or pale (white or golden) hairs, and are thems ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Microdon Mutabilis
''Microdon mutabilis'', is a species of hoverfly. It is found in many parts of Britain and Europe. The distinctive almost slug-like larvae live in ants' nests. They are hemispherical in shape, heavily armoured and believed to prey on the eggs and larvae of a number of ant species, including '' Formica lemani'', '' Formica fusca'', '' Lasius niger'' and '' Myrmica ruginodis''. It was described by Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné,#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. was a Swedish biologist and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming o ... in his landmark 1758 10th edition of ''Systema Naturae''. Description Wing length 6–9 mm. Pterostigma 2-2.5 times as long as the length of the wing margin between ends of wing veins R1 and R2+3. Scutellum red or dark red. The male genitalia are figured by Doczkal and Schmid (1999). Note ''M. mutabilis'' is only reliab ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carl Von Heyden
Carl Heinrich Georg(es) von Heyden (20 January 1793 Frankfurt – 7 July 1866) was a German senator and entomologist. He collected insects in all orders but was especially interested in Coleoptera, Microlepidoptera, Hymenoptera, Diptera and fossil insects. His collections are divided between the German Entomological Institute and the Senckenberg Museum. He studied forestry under Johann Matthäus Bechstein at the Dreißigacker Forest Academy near Meiningen, then continued his education at the University of Heidelberg. With his son, Lukas von Heyden, he conducted studies of fossil insects found in lignite. In addition to his entomological research, he performed investigations of reptile specimens collected by Eduard Rüppell in North Africa North Africa (sometimes Northern Africa) is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region. However, it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christian Rudolph Wilhelm Wiedemann
Christian Rudolph Wilhelm Wiedemann (7 December 1770 – 31 December 1840) was a German physician, historian, naturalist and entomologist. He is best known for his studies of world Diptera, but he also studied Hymenoptera and Coleoptera, although far less expertly. Biography Wiedemann’s father, Conrad Eberhard Wiedemann (1722–1804) was an art dealer and his mother, Dorothea Frederike (née Raspe) (1741–1804) was the daughter of an accountant in the Royal Mining Service and also interested in the arts. After his education in Brunswick, he matriculated in 1790 to the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Jena where he was a contemporary of the poet Friedrich von Hardenberg. While attending university, Wiedemann, was one of the many pupils of Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, and travelled to Saxony and Bohemia. He obtained his doctoral degree in 1792 with a thesis entitled ''Dissertatio inauguralis sistens vitia gennus humanum debilitantia''. He then went to Englan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spiracle (arthropods)
A spiracle or stigma is the opening in the exoskeletons of insects, myriapods, velvet worms and many arachnids to allow air to enter the trachea. Insect respiratory system differs from vertebrates'. The circulatory system plays a relatively minor role in circulating oxygen and removing carbon dioxide; instead, trachea and air sacs in the insect body allow direct gas exchange, and these tracheal tubes eventually connect to the external environment via spiracles. In most species, the spiracles are controlled by motor neurons in the central nervous system. It can be opened and closed in an efficient manner to admit air while minimizing associated physiological costs, such as water loss during respiration. Many sensory stimuli can affect the control of spiracles in insects, e.g. chemosensory (carbon dioxide, oxygen, etc.) or mechanosensory (sound, touch, etc.). It has been shown that during metabolically intensive behaviors, such as flight, insects can dynamically modulate the spir ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scale Insect
Scale insects are small insects of the Order (biology), order Hemiptera, suborder Sternorrhyncha. Of dramatically variable appearance and extreme sexual dimorphism, they comprise the infraorder Coccomorpha which is considered a more convenient grouping than the superfamily Coccoidea due to taxonomic uncertainties. Adult females typically have soft bodies and no limbs, and are concealed underneath domed scales, extruding quantities of wax for protection. Some species are hermaphroditic, with a combined ovotestis instead of separate ovaries and testes. Males, in the species where they occur, have legs and sometimes wings, and resemble small flies. Scale insects are herbivores, piercing plant tissues with their mouthparts and remaining in one place, feeding on sap. The excess fluid they imbibe is secreted as Honeydew (secretion), honeydew on which sooty mold tends to grow. The insects often have a Mutualism (biology), mutualistic relationship with ants, which feed on the honeydew and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mollusk
Mollusca is a phylum of protostomic invertebrate animals, whose members are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 76,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized, making it the second-largest animal phylum after Arthropoda. The number of additional fossil species is estimated between 60,000 and 100,000, and the proportion of undescribed species is very high. Many taxa remain poorly studied. Molluscs are the largest marine phylum, comprising about 23% of all the named marine organisms. They are highly diverse, not just in size and anatomical structure, but also in behaviour and habitat, as numerous groups are freshwater and even terrestrial species. The phylum is typically divided into 7 or 8 taxonomic classes, of which two are entirely extinct. Cephalopod molluscs, such as squid, cuttlefish, and octopuses, are among the most neurologically advanced of all invertebrates—and either the giant squid or the colossal squid is the largest known extant i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Calcar
The calcar, also known as the calcaneum, is the name given to a spur of cartilage arising from inner side of ankle and running along part of outer interfemoral membrane in bats, as well as to a similar spur on the legs of some arthropods. The calcar serves to help spread the interfemoral membrane, which is part of the wing membrane between the tail and the hind legs. Calcar (femorale) also refers to the dense, vertically oriented bone present in the Anatomical terms of location#Other terms, posteromedial region of the body of femur, femoral shaft Anatomical terms of location#superior and inferior, inferior to the Body of femur#lateral border and medial border, lesser trochanter. Usage history It is unclear who first coined the word "calcar" to apply to bat anatomy; records of its usage date to Joel Asaph Allen in 1893. The word calcar is derived from Latin "wiktionary:calx#Etymology 2, calx," meaning "heel". Other terms or phrases that refer to the same feature include "suppleme ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scutellum (insect)
The scutellum is the posterior portion of either the mesonotum or the metanotum of an insect thorax; however, it is used almost exclusively in the former context, as the metanotum is rather reduced in most insect groups. In the Hemiptera, and some Coleoptera, the scutellum is a small triangular plate behind the pronotum and between the forewing bases. In Diptera and Hymenoptera Hymenoptera is a large order of insects, comprising the sawflies, wasps, bees, and ants. Over 150,000 living species of Hymenoptera have been described, in addition to over 2,000 extinct ones. Many of the species are parasitic. Females typi ..., the scutellum is nearly always distinct, but much smaller than (and immediately posterior to) the mesoscutum. File:Heteroptera morphology-d.svg, 26 = Heteroptera scutellum File:Housefly anatomy-key.svg, 6 = Diptera scutellum File:Coléoptère schématique.jpg, 9 = Coleoptera scutellum File:Scheme ant worker anatomy-numbered.svg, 10 = Formicidae scutel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Antenna (biology)
An antenna (plural: antennae) is one of a pair of appendages used for Sensory system, sensing in arthropods. Antennae are sometimes referred to as ''feelers''. Antennae are connected to the first one or two Segmentation (biology), segments of the arthropod head. They vary widely in form but are always made of one or more jointed segments. While they are typically sensory organs, the exact nature of what they sense and how they sense it is not the same in all groups. Functions may variously include sensing tactition, touch, air motion, heat, vibration (sound), and especially insect olfaction, smell or gustation, taste. Antennae are sometimes modified for other purposes, such as mating, brooding, swimming, and even anchoring the arthropod to a substrate (biology), substrate. Larval arthropods have antennae that differ from those of the adult. Many crustaceans, for example, have free-swimming larvae that use their antennae for swimming. Antennae can also locate other group members i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tropics
The tropics are the regions of Earth surrounding the equator, where the sun may shine directly overhead. This contrasts with the temperate or polar regions of Earth, where the Sun can never be directly overhead. This is because of Earth's axial tilt; the width of the tropics (in latitude) is twice the tilt. The tropics are also referred to as the tropical zone and the torrid zone (see geographical zone). Due to the overhead sun, the tropics receive the most solar energy over the course of the year, and consequently have the highest temperatures on the planet. Even when not directly overhead, the sun is still close to overhead throughout the year, therefore the tropics also have the lowest seasonal variation on the planet; "winter" and "summer" lose their temperature contrast. Instead, seasons are more commonly divided by precipitation variations than by temperature variations. The tropics maintain wide diversity of local climates, such as rain forests, monsoons, sa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Myrmecophile
file:Panaphis juglandis.jpg , thumb , Myrmecophilous aphids being tended by ants Myrmecophily ( , ) consists of positive, Mutualism (biology), mutualistic, interspecies Association (ecology), associations between ants and a variety of other organisms, such as plants, other arthropods, and fungi. It may also include commensalism, commensal or even parasite, parasitic interactions. A "myrmecophile" is an animal that associates with ants. An estimated 10,000 species of ants (Formicidae) are known, with a higher biodiversity, diversity in the tropics. In most terrestrial ecosystems, ants are ecologically and numerically dominant, being the main invertebrate predators. As a result, ants play a key role in controlling arthropod richness, abundance, and community structure. Some evidence shows that the evolution of myrmecophilous interactions has contributed to the abundance and ecological success of ants, by ensuring a dependable and energy-rich food supply, thus providing a competit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
