The Klingon batbugs: Morphological adaptations in the primitive bat bugs, <i>Bucimex chilensis </i>and <i>Primicimex cavernis</i>, including updated phylogeny of Cimicidae
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract The Cimicidae is a family of blood‐dependent ectoparasites in which dispersion capacity is greatly associated with host movements. Bats are the ancestral and most prevalent hosts for cimicids. Cimicids have a worldwide distribution matching that of their hosts, but the global classification is incomplete, especially for species outside the most common Cimicidae taxa. In this study, we place a little‐studied cimicid species, Bucimex chilensis, within a comprehensive molecular phylogeny of Cimicidae by sequencing the genomic regions of this and other closely related species. For this study, we collected B. chilensis females from Myotis chiloensis in Tierra del Fuego, 1,300 km further south than previously known southernmost distribution boundary. We also sequenced COI regions from Primicimex cavernis, a species which together with B. chilensis comprise the entire subfamily Primiciminae. Using Bayesian posterior probability and maximum‐likelihood approaches, we found that B. chilensis and P. cavernis clustered close to each other in the molecular analyses, receiving support from similar morphological features, agreeing with the morphology‐based taxonomic placement of the two species within the subfamily Primiciminae. We also describe a previously unrecognized morphological adaptation of the tarsal structure, which allows the austral bat ectoparasite, B. chilensis, to cling on to the pelage of its known host, the Chilean myotis (Myotis chiloensis). Through a morphological study and behavioral observation, we elucidate how this tarsal structure operates, and we hypothesize that by clinging in the host pelage, B. chilensis is able to disperse effectively to new areas despite low host density. This is a unique feature shared by P. cavernis, the only other species in Primiciminae.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".