Reduviidae

Assassin Bug
An adult assassin bug
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Hemiptera
Suborder:	Heteroptera
Superfamily:	Cimicomorpha
Family:	Reduviidae Latreille, 1807
Subfamilies
Apiomerinae Ectrichodiinae Emesinae Harpactorinae Holoptilinae Peiratinae Phymatinae Reduviinae Saicinae Salyavatinae Stenopodainae Tegeinae Triatominae Tribelocephalinae etc.

Reduviidae (from the contained genus, Reduvius which comes from the Latin reduvia meaning hangnail or remnant) is a large, cosmopolitan family of predatory insects in the suborder Heteroptera. It includes assassin bugs (genera include Melanolestes, Platymeris, Psellipus, Rasahus, Reduvius, Rhiginia, Sinea, Triatoma, and Zelus), wheel bugs (Arilus cristatus), and thread-legged bugs (the subfamily Emesinae, including the genus Emesaya). There are about 7000 species altogether, making it one of the largest families in the Hemiptera.

Physical characteristics

A Zelus genus nymph from the Southeastern United States.

Adult insects often range from 4 to 40 mm. They most commonly have an elongated head with a distinct narrowed neck, long legs, and a prominent, segmented tube for feeding (rostrum). Most species are dark in color with hues of brown, black, red, or orange. The most distinctive feature of the family is that the tip of the rostrum fits into a groove in the prosternum, where it is rasped against ridges there (a stridulitrum) to produce sound, a tactic often used to intimidate predators. If harassment continues, they can use their rostrum to deliver a painful bite which in some species can be medically significant.

Feeding

They use the long rostrum to inject a lethal saliva that liquefies the insides of the prey, which are then sucked out. The legs of some of these bugs are covered in tiny hairs that serve to make them sticky to hold onto their prey while they feed. The saliva is commonly effective at killing substantially larger prey than the bug itself. As nymphs, some species will cover and camouflage themselves with debris, or the remains of dead prey insects. Some species have been known to feed on cockroaches or bedbugs (in the case of the masked hunter) and are regarded in many locations as beneficial. Some people breed them as pets and for insect control.

Some assassin bug groups specialize on certain prey groups, such as ants (feather-legged bugs - Holoptilinae), termites, or diplopods (Ectrichodiinae).

Some blood-sucking species, particularly Triatoma spp. and other members of the subfamily Triatominae (e.g., Paratriatoma hirsuta) , are also known as kissing bugs due to their habit of biting humans in their sleep on the soft tissue of the lips and eyes; a number of these haematophagous species, located in Central and South America, are able to transmit a potentially fatal trypanosome disease known as Chagas disease (American trypanosomiasis).

Phylogeny

Current taxonomy is based on morphological characteristics. The first cladistic analysis based on molecular data (mitochondrial and nuclear ribosomla DNA) was published in 2009 and called into question the monophylogeny of some current groups, such as the emesinae.

See also

• Reduviid bite

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Reduviidae

Wikispecies has information related to: Reduviidae

• Reduviidae Systematics Research at UC Riverside

References

• Weirauch, Christiane & Munro, James B. 2009. Molecular phylogeny of the assassin bugs (Hemiptera: Reduviidae), based on mitochondrial and nuclear ribosomal genes. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution: 53 (2009) 287–299