A Taxonomic Study On The Genus Oxyporus Of China Mainland (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae: Oxyporinae)

Staphylinidae is one of the largest families in Coleoptera in Insecta. About 36000 species of thisfamily have been known to the world. They occupy a wide variety of habitats consists of fields,forests, jungles, mountains, riversides and shores; some species are even mammal ectozoa. Theyfeed on a wide range of food; besides most carnivorous species, there are also omnivorous,saprophagous, coprophagous, fungivorous, carpophagous and pollinophagous species. Staphylinidaehas a close relationship with human and is a unneglectable natural resource. Some of them could benatural enemies of verminous insects, and some could be used as medicinal materials while some arehygienic pests.Oxyporus is the only genus of the subfamily Oxyporinae in the family Staphylinidae. It wasestablished by Fabricius in 1775 with the type species Staphylinus rufus Linné. Up to the present, atleast 101 species of the genus have been known from the world and distribute in the Palaearctic,Oriental, Nearctic and Neotropical Regions. There have been 27 species known from China, ofwhich 20 in the Mainland, 7 in Taiwan.In China, however, taxonomic Study of this genus is behindhand. Up to now, there had beenonly some sporadic studies but no systematic works concerning Chinese Oxyporus. Most of theChinese known species were described or recorded by foreign scholars and the type specimens weredeposited overseas. It leaves us a unsubstantial basis of the study Chinese Oxyporus fauna.In world fauna, China bestrides both Palaearctic and Oriental Regions. Because of the manyspecies of this genus in China, the author selected it as the topic of his MS thesis. The study wasbased on consulting all related literature and careful examinations of over 430 specimens collectedfrom a lot of places in China such as Jilin, Heilongjiang, Neimenggu, Henan, Yunnan, Zhejiang andXizang. The results of this study are summarized as below:1. This paper was the first systematic study of the genus Oxyporus of China mainland.2. Within the paper, 23 species of the genus from China mainland were recognized, including6 known species, 2 new recorded species and 15 new species (4 new species and 1 newrecord have been already published).3. All involved species were described detailedly, with the research history, synonym,collecting data and distribution of each species. The color photos of all the species weregiven and the diagnostic characters were illustrated.4. The key to species of the genus Oxyporus of China mainland was provided.5. A catalog of the genus Oxyporus of world was edited.6. A database of all the known species of Oxyporus of the world was established.