Review of Paraphotina (Mantodea: Photinaidae)

ABSTRACT

The number of studies on Neotropical mantises has been growing in recent years, and the systematics of Mantodea is now a dynamic field with noteworthy contributions. Several taxonomic revisions have been published recently. The taxonomy of Paraphotina Giglio-Tos, 1915 is reviewed as part of current studies on systematics of Neotropical Mantodea. Currently, Paraphotina contains four species from South America P. caatingaensis (Menezes & Bravo, 2013) comb. nov., P. insolita (Rehn, 1941), P. occidentalis Lombardo, 1998 and P. reticulata (Saussure, 1871). Paraphotina venezuelana Beier, 1963 is a new junior synonym of P. insolita . Keys for the Paraphotina species are proposed. The distribution of Paraphotina species is apparently correlates with areas of endemism in the Amazonian and Cerrado regions.