Stejskal Vaclav, Vendl Tomas, Feng Shiqian, Qin Yujia, Aulicky Radek, Li Zhihong
Department of Stored Product Pest Management, Czech Agrifood Research Center, Prague, Czech Republic.
Department of Plant Biosecurity, College of Plant Protection, China Agricultural University, Beijing, China.
J Insect Sci. 2025 Mar 14;25(2). doi: 10.1093/jisesa/ieaf019.
Taxonomy provides a general foundation for research on insects. Using stored product pest (SPP) arthropods as a model group, this article overviews the historical impacts of taxonomy on applied entomology. The article surveys the dynamics of historical descriptions of new species in various SPP taxa; the majority of all species (90%) were described prior to 1925, while the key pests were described prior to 1866. The review shows that process of describing new SPP species is not random but is influenced by following factors: (i) larger species tend to be described earlier than smaller and SPP moths and beetles are described earlier than psocids and mites; (ii) key economic pests are on average described earlier than less significant ones. Considering a species name as a "password" to unique information resources, this review also assesses the historical number of synonymous or duplicate names of SPP species. Pests belonging to some higher taxa Lepidoptera and Coleoptera has accumulated more scientific synonyms than those others belonging to Psocoptera and Acari. Number of synonyms positively correlated with the economic importance of SPP species. The review summarized semantic origin of SPP names showing minor proportion of names (17.6%) are toponyms (geography) or eponyms (people), while the majority (82.4%) fall into other categories (descriptive, etc.). It is concluded that awareness of taxonomic advances, including changes to species and higher taxa names, should be effectively communicated to pest control practitioners and applied entomology students, and specifically addressed in relevant textbooks, web media, and databases.
分类学为昆虫研究提供了一个总体基础。本文以仓储害虫节肢动物为模型组，概述了分类学对应用昆虫学的历史影响。文章调查了各类仓储害虫分类单元中新物种历史描述的动态情况；所有物种中的大多数（90%）是在1925年之前被描述的，而主要害虫则是在1866年之前被描述的。该综述表明，新的仓储害虫物种的描述过程并非随机，而是受到以下因素的影响：（i）较大的物种往往比较小的物种更早被描述，仓储害虫中的蛾类和甲虫类比啮虫和螨类更早被描述；（ii）关键的经济害虫平均比较次要的害虫更早被描述。将物种名称视为获取独特信息资源的“密码”，本综述还评估了仓储害虫物种同义名或重复名的历史数量。属于鳞翅目和鞘翅目等一些较高分类单元的害虫积累的科学同义词比属于啮虫目和蜱螨目的其他害虫更多。同义词的数量与仓储害虫物种的经济重要性呈正相关。该综述总结了仓储害虫名称的语义来源，表明名称中较小比例（17.6%）是地名（地理）或人名（人物），而大多数（82.4%）属于其他类别（描述性等）。结论是，应将分类学进展的相关信息，包括物种和较高分类单元名称的变化，有效地传达给害虫防治从业者和应用昆虫学专业的学生，并在相关教科书、网络媒体和数据库中专门提及。
