Signiphoridae (historically also known as Thysanidae) is a small family of

parasitic wasp Parasitoid wasps are a large group of hymenopteran superfamilies, with all but the wood wasps (Orussoidea) being in the wasp-waisted Apocrita. As parasitoids, they lay their eggs on or in the bodies of other arthropods, sooner or later causi ...

s in the superfamily Chalcidoidea. The roughly 80 species are placed in four genera.

Diagnosis

The Signiphoridae range in size from . They are usually black, brown, or yellowish, occasionally with

salmon pink Salmon is a range of pinkish- orange to light pink colors, named after the color of salmon flesh. The first recorded use of ''salmon'' as a color name in English was in 1776.Maerz and Paul ''A Dictionary of Color'' New York:1930 McGraw-Hill Pag ...

or white details, but never metallic. Cuticle sculpturing is very light when compared to families such as the Eurytomidae or

Chalcididae The Chalcididae are a moderate-sized family within the Chalcidoidea, composed mostly of parasitoids and a few hyperparasitoids. The family is apparently polyphyletic, though the different subfamilies may each be monophyletic, and some may be elev ...

. The main diagnostic characteristics are: * The

metasoma The metasoma is the posterior part of the body, or tagma, of arthropods whose body is composed of three parts, the other two being the prosoma and the mesosoma. In insects, it contains most of the digestive tract, respiratory system, and circul ...

is sessile (no "wasp waist"); the

propodeum The propodeum or propodium is the first abdominal segment in Apocrita Hymenoptera (wasps, bees and ants). It is fused with the thorax to form the mesosoma. It is a single large sclerite A sclerite (Greek , ', meaning " hard") is a hardened bod ...

has a medium triangular zone. * The antennal club is long, unsegmented, and preceded by one to four ring-like segments ("annelli"). * The wings have medium to long marginal setae, short postmarginal and stigmal veins, and no, one or two setae on the membrane.

Habitat

''Chartocerus'' and ''Thysanus'' have cosmopolitan distributions. The only formal record for ''Clytina'' is from Eastern Europe. ''Signiphora'', which represents more than half of the known species, is primarily

Neotropical The Neotropical realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms constituting Earth's land surface. Physically, it includes the tropical terrestrial ecoregions of the Americas and the entire South American temperate zone. Definition In bioge ...

Biology

Most species have been reared in association with scale insects, mealybugs,

aphid Aphids are small sap-sucking insects and members of the superfamily Aphidoidea. Common names include greenfly and blackfly, although individuals within a species can vary widely in color. The group includes the fluffy white woolly aphids. A t ...

psyllid Psyllidae, the jumping plant lice or psyllids, are a family of small plant-feeding insects that tend to be very host-specific, i.e. each plant-louse species only feeds on one plant species (monophagous) or feeds on a few closely related plants ...

s and flies ( chamaemyiids, gall-making chloropids, and drosophilid predators of scale insects. They can be either parasitoids or hyperparasitoids. While parasitoids contribute to control populations of other insects, hyperparasitoids can disrupt systems under biological control.

Systematics and classification

Woolley made several changes in the classification at genus and species level after a

phylogenetic In biology, phylogenetics (; from Greek φυλή/ φῦλον [] "tribe, clan, race", and wikt:γενετικός, γενετικός [] "origin, source, birth") is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups o ...

analysis of the family. The available generic names in this group are ''Signiphora'' Ashmead, ''Thysanus'' Walker, ''Chartocerus'' Motschulsky, ''Clytina'' Erdös, ''Neosigniphora'' Rust, ''Kerrichiella'' Rozanov, ''Rozanoviella'' Subba Rao, ''Xana'' Kurdjumov, ''Matritia'' Mercet, ''Signiphorina'' Nikol'skaya and ''Neocales'' Risbec. The four last names are under synonymy or considered as subgenera in ''Chartocerus''. ''Rozanoviella'' and ''Kerrichiella'' are synonymized under ''Signiphora''. ''Neosigniphora'' is synonymized under ''Thysanus''. Hence, currently only four genera are valid. Subfamilies are not recognized. Signiphoridae are believed to be most closely related to azotine aphelinids.Woolley, J. B. (1988). Phylogeny and classification of the Signiphoridae (Hymenoptera: Chalcidoidea). '' Systematic Entomology'' 13:465-501.

References

External links

Universal Chalcidoidea Database

{{Taxonbar, from=Q254158 Chalcidoidea Apocrita families