Wetting Characteristics of Insect Wing Surfaces

Biological tiny structures have been observed on many kinds of surfaces such as lotus leaves,which have an effect on the coloration of Morpho butterflies and enhance the hydrophobicity of natural surfaces.We investigated the micro-scale and nano-scale structures on the wing surfaces of insects and found that the hierarchical multiple roughness structures help in enhancing the hydrophobicity.After examining 10 orders and 24 species of flying Pterygotan insects,we found that micro-scale and nano-scale structures typically exist on both the upper and lower wing surfaces of flying insects.The tiny structures such as denticle or setae on the insect wings enhance the hydrophobicity,thereby enabling the wings to be cleaned more easily.And the hydrophobic insect wings undergo a transition from Cassie to Wenzel states at pitch/size ratio of about 20.In order to examine the wetting characteristics on a rough surface,a biomimetic surface with micro-scale pillars is fabricated on a silicon wafer, which exhibits the same behavior as the insect wing,with the Cassie-Wenzel transition occurring consistently around a pitch/width value of 20.

Insect community structures along elevation gradients on Mt.Seongak-san, South Korea

Insect communities along three elevation gra- dients on Mt. Seongak-san, South Korea, were investigated from May to September 2013 using traps in order to collect basic data for distributional monitoring of species in a forest ecosystem. A total of 2698 individuals of 309 moth species of 18 families were collected in bucket-light traps, along with 196 individuals of 26 ground-beetle species and 11,276 individuals of 14 ant species in pit-fall traps. The insect community at each site was analyzed using analysisof variance and non-metric multidimensional scaling （NMS）. The ground-beetle and ant abundances varied with elevation. The NMS showed distinct clusters of moths between the ground-beetle and ant distributions with ele- vation and month. The community-level responses of these insect groups to those gradients were analyzed.

First discovery of a cave-dwelling Tineid moth(Lepidoptera, Tineidae) from East Asia

In this study, we report Monopis crocicapitella （Clemens, 1859） （Tineidae）, which was collected from bat guano in a cave in the southern region of Korea, for the first time from East Asia. We briefly redescribe and illustrate the external morphology and genital structures of both sexes. Also, we discuss the local habitat characteristics and some of the ecological information that was observed during our field investi-gation.

Indigenous parasitoids as effective natural enemies of Phyllocnistis citrella(Lepidoptera:Gracillariidae)in Korea

This study is aimed to investigate the occurrence of Phyllocnistis citrella Stainton （citrus leafminer; CLM）, which has recently caused increasing damage to citrus farms in southern South Korea, and its natural enemies, which can act as biological control agents. In the present study, CLM monitoring using sex pheromone traps were conducted in the major citrus farms in the Jeju region in South Korea. Also a survey of parasites was carried out to detect the effective control agent for CLM. During the investigation from 2011 to 2015, a relatively large number of adult CLM （2,386,990） were observed in the sex pheromone traps. The mean annual occurrence of CLM was 477,398, which showed an increasing trend with the increase in temperature. A survey of parasites was conducted in November 2015. Six parasites were found, of which, Quadrastichus sp. and Sympiesis sp. showed the highest rates of parasitism. The mean rate of parasitism during the survey period was 3.97 %. We discovered four new species of parasites of CLM in South Korea.