Deuterophlebia, also known as mountain midges are a genus of flies that are the sole living members of the small family Deuterophlebiidae. Adults have broad, fan-shaped wings, and males have extremely long antennae which they employ when contesting territories over running water, waiting for females to hatch.[2] Larvae occur in swiftly flowing streams and are easily recognized by their forked antennae and the prolegs on the abdomen.

Deuterophlebia
Deuterophlebia mirabilis
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Diptera
Suborder: Nematocera
Infraorder: Deuterophlebiomorpha
Family: Deuterophlebiidae
Edwards, 1922
Genus: Deuterophlebia
Edwards, 1922[1]
Species
  • See text

One classification places this family in its own infraorder Deuterophlebiomorpha, but this has not gained wide acceptance.[3] A recent phylogeny of the entire order Diptera places them as the sister group to all other flies.[4]

Fossil members of the family are known from the mid-Cretaceous Burmese amber of Myanmar, dating to around 100 million years ago.[5]

Species

edit

Species of the genus are known from Afghanistan, Kashmir, Northeast India, China, Japan, Korea, Eastern Siberia, and western North America from Alaska to California to Colorado.[5]

Catalogue of Life accepts the following species within Deuterophlebia:[6]

References

edit
  1. ^ "Deuterophlebia". Integrated Taxonomic Information System.
  2. ^ Alexandr P. Rasnitsyn, Haichun Zhang & Bo Wang (2006). "Bizarre fossil insects: web-spinning sawflies of the genus Ferganolyda (Vespida, Pamphilioidea) from the Middle Jurassic of Daohugou, Inner Mongolia, China". Palaeontology. 49 (4): 907–916. Bibcode:2006Palgy..49..907R. doi:10.1111/j.1475-4983.2006.00574.x.
  3. ^ Walter Hackman & Rauno Väisänen (1982). "Different classification systems in the Diptera" (PDF). Annales Zoologici Fennici. 19: 209–219.
  4. ^ Wiegmann, B.; et al. (2011). "Episodic radiations in the fly tree of life" (PDF). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 108 (14): 5690–5. Bibcode:2011PNAS..108.5690W. doi:10.1073/pnas.1012675108. PMC 3078341. PMID 21402926.
  5. ^ a b Krzemińska, Ewa; Soszyńska, Agnieszka; Kania-Kłosok, Iwona; Skibińska, Kornelia; Kopeć, Katarzyna; van de Kamp, Thomas; Zhang, Qingqing; Krzemiński, Wiesław (2024-10-22). "First fossil mountain midges (Diptera, Deuterophlebiidae) and their evolutionary and ecological implication". Scientific Reports. 14 (1): 24864. doi:10.1038/s41598-024-75389-y. ISSN 2045-2322. PMC 11496880.
  6. ^ "Deuterophlebia | COL". www.catalogueoflife.org. Retrieved 2022-05-30.

Further reading

edit
edit