Lutzomyia [SEP] parent taxon
Lutzomyia
Lutzomyia is a genus of phlebotomine sand flies consisting of nearly 400 species, at least 33 of which have medical importance as vectors of human disease. Species of the genus "Lutzomyia" are found only in the New World, distributed in southern areas of the Nearctic and throughout the Neotropic zone. "Lutzomyia" is one of the two genera of the subfamily Phlebotominae to transmit the Leishmania parasite, with the other being "Phlebotomus", found only in the Old World. "Lutzomyia" sand flies also serve as
Taxon in disguise
In bacteriology, a taxon in disguise is a species, genus or higher unit of biological classification whose evolutionary history reveals has evolved from another unit of similar or lower rank, making the parent unit paraphyletic. This happens when rapid evolution makes a new species appear radically different from the ancestral group, so that it is not (initially) recognised as belonging to the parent phylogenetic group, leaving the latter an evolutionary grade.
While the term is from bacteriology, parallel examples are found throughout the tree of