Lobosternum
genus of insects
Lobosternum is a monotypic genus of the pleasing fungus beetles (family Erotylidae). It was established by Edmund Reitter in 1875 to contain the diminutive species Lobosternum clavicorne from Chile.
Some authors place this genus in tribe Empocryptini of subfamily Cryptophilinae, others accept fewer subfamilies in the Erotylidae and place Lobosternum in tribe Cryptophilini or Empocryptini of subfamily Xenoscelinae. Earlier authors usually allied Lobosternum with the lizard beetles, at that time held to be a distinct family Languriidae, wherein Lobosternum was placed in subfamily Toraminae. But the "Languriidae" was actually paraphyletic with Erotylidae and eventually was merged into it.
Description
L. clavicorne adults are tiny beetles, only 1.4–1.8 mm long, oval and parallel-sided in shape, with a rounded back, and antennae which end in conspicuous loose "clubs". They are blackish-brown all over, with an indistinct lighter spot on the "shoulders" of each elytron.
Head
On the head, there is a weak but distinct straight line across the "throat", and the clypeus has a distinct straight margin but no suture where it meets the "forehead". A single wide row of file-like structures for producing squeaking sounds is present on the rear neck in all adults, with no sexual difference. There is a spine below the cheeks on each side of the head, near the base of which there starts a patch of glandular ducts which extend to the prothorax.
“Lobosternum” enters the record as genus of insects. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Lobosternum, genus and insects can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Lobosternum” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Lobosternum, genus and insects provides the most credible route into that argument.
The date and method of observation matter as much as the stated conclusion, especially where classification or consensus has changed. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q10319479. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1875.
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This entry incorporates text from “Lobosternum” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.