Speciation and Dispersion Hypotheses of Phlebotomine Sandflies of the subgenus Paraphlebotomus Diptera:Psychodidae : The Case in Turkey

Authors : Bülent Alten

Pages : 229-248

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Publication Date : 2010-08-01

Article Type : Other

Abstract :Phlebotomine sandflies are delicate, hairy flies with long slender legs. Of the 1000 or so species, only about 70 species are thought to be involved in the transmission of disease to man. The flies are easily distinguished from other small Diptera when alive by the characteristic manner in which they hold their pointed wings above their body like a vertical V , especially from other members of the family Psychodidae to which they belong. It is important to distinguish phlebotomine sandflies from other small biting flies known colloquially as 'sandflies' in certain parts of the world, especially midges of the genus Culicoides which abound in coastal areas of the southeastern United States, Central America and the Caribbean, and Simuliidae in Australasia. These other flies have very different biologies and medical importance from phlebotomines [1]. Phlebotomines are commonly known as sand flies, a reference arising from the phlebotomines-leishmaniasis associations studied extensively in the drier regions of the Mediterranean and Middle East. Unfortunately, this name is often confused with sand flies of the family Ceratopogidae, a family with very different behaviors and vector-disease associations. Second, phlebotomines in the western hemisphere have little association with sand. They are, instead, most commonly distributed in forest from southern United States to northern Argentina [2].
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