''Nessaea'' is a genus of

nymphalid The Nymphalidae are the largest family of butterflies, with more than 6,000 species distributed throughout most of the world. Belonging to the superfamily Papilionoidea, they are usually medium-sized to large butterflies. Most species have ...

butterflies found in the

Neotropical realm The Neotropical realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms constituting Earth's land surface. Physically, it includes the tropics, tropical Ecoregion#Terrestrial, terrestrial ecoregions of the Americas and the entire South American temperat ...

. Unlike virtually all other butterflies with blue coloration, the blue colors in this genus are due to

pigment A pigment is a powder used to add or alter color or change visual appearance. Pigments are completely or nearly solubility, insoluble and reactivity (chemistry), chemically unreactive in water or another medium; in contrast, dyes are colored sub ...

ation terobilin (biliverdin IXγ)ref>Doug Taron
"It's all in the structure"
''Gossamer Tapestry'', Retrieved January 25, 2017 rather than

iridescence Iridescence (also known as goniochromism) is the phenomenon of certain surfaces that appear gradually to change colour as the angle of view or the angle of illumination changes. Iridescence is caused by wave interference of light in microstru ...

(e.g., '' Morpho'' species).

Species

Accepted species: *'' Nessaea aglaura'' Doubleday 848/small> – common olivewing, northern nessaea or Aglaura olivewing *'' Nessaea ecuadorensis'' Talbot 1932 *'' Nessaea batesii'' C. & R. Felder 1860 – Bates olivewing *'' Nessaea magniplaga'' Röber 1928 *'' Nessaea hewitsonii'' C. & R. Felder 1859 – Hewitson's olivewing *'' Nessaea obrinus''

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 ...

1758 Events January–March * January 1 – Swedish biologist Carl Linnaeus (Carl von Linné) publishes in Stockholm the first volume (''Animalia'') of the 10th edition of ''Systema Naturae'', the starting point of modern zoologic ...

– obrina olivewing *'' Nessaea faventia'' Fruhstorfer 1910 *'' Nessaea latifascia'' Röber 1928 *'' Nessaea romani'' Bryk 1953 *'' Nessaea regina'' Salvin 1869 *'' Nessaea thalia'' Bargmann 1928 Unaccepted species: *'' Nessaea margaretha'' Krüger 1933 -

unavailable name In reliability engineering, the term availability has the following meanings: * The degree to which a system, subsystem or equipment is in a specified operable and committable state at the start of a mission, when the mission is called for at a ...

and

infrasubspecific name In biology, taxonomic rank (which some authors prefer to call nomenclatural rank because ranking is part of nomenclature rather than taxonomy proper, according to some definitions of these terms) is the relative or absolute level of a group of or ...

*'' Nessaea ancaeus''

1767 - junior subjective synonym *'' Nessaea lesoudieri'' Le Moult 1933 - junior subjective synonym *'' Nessaea coniuncta'' Krüger 1933 - unavailable name and infrasubspecific name

Images

File:Nessaeanag.jpg, ''Nessaea aglaura'' File:Nessaea batesii MHNT.jpg, ''Nessaea batesii'' males File:Nessaeaof.jpg, ''Nessaea obrinus'' female - upperside File:Nessaeaom.jpg, ''Nessaea obrinus'' male - upperside File:Nessaeaou.jpg, ''Nessaea obrinus'' - underside File:Obrinus olivewing (Nessaea obrinus faventia).JPG, Obrinus olivewing (''N. obrinus faventia'', male,

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

File:Nesaea hewitsonii on my hand.jpg, Nessaea hewitsonii

References

*Vane-Wright, R.I. 1979. The coloration, identification and phylogeny of ''Nessaea'' butterflies (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae). ''Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History), Entomology'', 38: 27–56.

External links

*
Images representing ''Nessaea''
at Encyclopedia of Life
"''Nessaea'' Hübner, [1819]"
at Markku Savela's ''Lepidoptera and Some Other Life Forms'' Biblidinae">819]"">"''Nessaea'' Hübner, [1819]"
at Markku Savela's ''Lepidoptera and Some Other Life Forms'' Biblidinae Nymphalidae of South America Taxa named by Jacob Hübner Nymphalidae genera Taxa described in 1819 {{Biblidinae-stub