The Phylogeny and Classification of Anopheles

By R. Harbach. 2013

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Anopheles was introduced as a genus of mosquitoes in 1818 by Johann Wilhelm Meigen [1], a German entomologist famous for his revolutionary studies of Diptera. Little was done on the taxonomy of Anopheles until the discovery during the last two decades of the 19th century that mosquitoes transmit microfilariae and malarial protozoa, which initiated a drive to collect, name and classify these insects. In 1898, the Royal Society and the Rt. Hon. Joseph Chamber‐ lain, Secretary of State for the Colonies of Britain, appointed a Committee to supervise the investigation of malaria. On 6 December 1898, Mr. Chamberlain directed the Colonies to collect and send mosquitoes to the British Museum (Natural History) (Figure 1), and in 1899 the Committee appointed Frederick V. Theobald to prepare a monograph on the mosquitoes of the world, which was published in five volumes between 1901 and 1910 [2‒6]. As a conse‐ quence, many new generic names were introduced in an effort to classify numerous new mosquito species into seemingly natural groups. Theobald proposed 18 genera for species of Anopheles based on the distribution and shape of scales on the thorax and abdomen. Four of these proposed genera, Cellia, Kerteszia, Nyssorhynchus and Stethomyia, are currently recognized as subgenera of Anopheles and the other 14 are regarded as synonyms of one or other of subgenera Anopheles, Cellia or Nyssorhynchus. Theobald, however, was not the only person to propose generic names for species of Anopheles. During the first three decades of the 20th century, 37 genera (including the 18 recognized by Theobald) were established for species of Anopheles [7].

Subfields: Insect Science, Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health

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