''Afropolonia'' is a genus of

chigger ''Trombicula'', known as chiggers, red bugs, scrub-itch mites, or berry bugs, are small arachnids (eight-legged arthropods) in the Trombiculidae family. In their larval stage, they attach to various animals and humans, then feed on skin, often ...

in the family

Trombiculidae Trombiculidae (), commonly referred to in North America as chiggers and in Britain as harvest mites, but also known as berry bugs, bush-mites, red bugs or scrub-itch mites, are a family of mites. Chiggers are often confused with jiggers – a ...

, subfamily Apoloniinae, and tribe Apoloniini. , it is monospecific, just consisting of its

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

''A. tgifi''. It is found in South Africa. Its

type host In biology, a type is a particular specimen (or in some cases a group of specimens) of an organism to which the scientific name of that organism is formally associated. In other words, a type is an example that serves to anchor or centralizes t ...

is the

Namaqua rock rat The Namaqua rock rat (''Micaelamys namaquensis'') is a species of rodent in the family Muridae. It is sometimes included in the genus ''Aethomys''. It is found in Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Eswatini, Za ...

. M. Lee Goff

circumscribed In geometry, a circumscribed circle for a set of points is a circle passing through each of them. Such a circle is said to ''circumscribe'' the points or a polygon formed from them; such a polygon is said to be ''inscribed'' in the circle. * Circum ...

''Afropolonia'' and described ''A. tgifi'' in 1983.

Diagnosis and description

keys Key, Keys, The Key or The Keys may refer to: Common uses * Key (cryptography), a piece of information needed to encode or decode a message * Key (instrument), a component of a musical instrument * Key (lock), a device used to operate a lock * ...

to Apoloniinae species written by Goff in 1983, by Goff and colleagues in 1989, and by Wayne A. Brown in 2006, ''Afropolonia tgifi'' was paired with ''Apolonia tigipioensis'', the sole species of its genus. All three of these keys noted ''Afropolonia'' could be distinguished from ''Apolonia'' in having five branched

setae In biology, setae (; seta ; ) are any of a number of different bristle- or hair-like structures on living organisms. Animal setae Protostomes Depending partly on their form and function, protostome setae may be called macrotrichia, chaetae ...

on the palpal tarsus and in lacking subterminala I. Russian acarologist Alexandr A. Stekolnikov's 2018 key to African Trombiculidae paired ''Afropolonia'' with a pair including ''Straelensia'' and ''Vargatula''. His key distinguished ''Afropolonia'' from those two genera in having both an anterior and a posterior pair of sternal setae, in having branched galealae, and having a coxal setation formula of 1-1-1. The idiosoma, or body, of the ''A. tgifi'' larva measures . Its anterior eyes are 11 μm in diameter while its posterior eyes have a diameter of 6 μm.

Phylogeny

''Afropolonia'' is in the subfamily Apoloniinae. Goff placed ''Afropolonia'' in the tribe Apoloniini due to the sensillae having an "unexpanded" shape. Goff also included the genera '' Apolonia'', '' Straelensia'', '' Vargatula'', and '' Womersia'' in Apoloniini, following P. H. Vercammen-Grandjean and M. Kolebinova's 1968 circumscription of the tribe. A fifth genus, '' Liuella'' was later added to this tribe.

Distribution

''Afropolonia'' is found in South Africa. The type locality for ''A. tgifi'' is Studers Pass.

Biology

Namaqua rock mouse feeding on Pagoda Lily nectar

The

is the

. , this is the only known host.

Taxonomic history

The American entomologist M. Lee Goff

the genus ''Afropolonia'' in 1983. Goff designated ''A. tgifi'', which he described in the same work, as the genus's

. This was the sole species included in the genus. Goff's description was based on two specimens collected in 1980. The

holotype A holotype (Latin: ''holotypus'') is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of s ...

was deposited in the

Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences The Museum of Natural Sciences (, ; , ) is a Brussels museum dedicated to natural history. It is a part of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (; ), itself part of the institutions of the Belgian Federal Science Policy Office (BELSP ...

; the paratype was deposited in the

National Museum of Natural History The National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. With 4.4 ...

. The

specific epithet In Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin gramm ...

of the type species comes from the acronym ''TGIF'' ("Thank God It's Friday"). Goff had initially planned to describe this species in the ''

Journal of Medical Entomology The ''Journal of Medical Entomology'' is a peer-reviewed bimonthly scientific journal published by Oxford University Press for the Entomological Society of America. The journal publishes reports on all aspects of medical entomology and medical ac ...

'', although they rejected his paper because of this name; at the time, the

ICZN Code The International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) is a widely accepted convention in zoology that rules the formal scientific naming of organisms treated as animals. It is also informally known as the ICZN Code, for its formal author, t ...

discouraged "comical" names. Goff has surmised that the ''Bulletin of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences'' subsequently accepted his paper because the European editors were unfamiliar with this term.

Notes

References

{{taxonbar, from=Q51129599, from2=Q133335897 Trombidiformes genera Monotypic arachnid genera Arachnids of Africa Trombiculidae Endemic fauna of South Africa Parasitic arthropods of mammals