Mantophasmatidae

Mantophasmatidae is a unique family of wingless, carnivorous insects.

They belong to the order Mantophasmatodea. Many people call them gladiators, though they have other names like rock crawlers or heelwalkers. These insects are hard to find because they lack wings, even as adults. They look like a physical cross between a praying mantis and a phasmid. Scientists study them to understand how insect groups relate to one another. They are considered the sister group to the Grylloblattodea. This means they share a close evolutionary connection.

The biology of these insects is quite specialized. As carnivores, they hunt other living things for food. To find mates, they use a specific form of communication. They transmit vibrations through the ground or the substrate they are standing on. During copulation, the male uses his cerci to hold the female. Cerci are small, one-segmented appendages at the end of the abdomen. The male bends his flexible abdomen around the female's right side to grasp her. This mating process is notably long and can last for up to three days.

Scientists have organized these insects into several groups. The family Mantophasmatidae includes many different genera. Some taxonomists choose to rank these groups differently. They might treat the subfamilies or tribes as full families. Others might classify the entire Mantophasmatodea as a suborder. One subfamily is called Tanzaniophasmatinae, which includes the genus Tanzaniophasma. Another is Mantophasmatinae, which contains several different tribes. These tribes include Tyrannophasmatini, Mantophasmatini, and Austrophasmatini. Each group contains specific genera that live in different regions.

The history of their discovery began very recently. Scientists first described the gladiators in 2001. They did not start with live insects in the wild. Instead, they used old specimens held in museums. These included samples from Namibia and Tanzania. They also studied a 45-million-year-old fossil found in Baltic amber. This fossil is known as *Raptophasma kerneggeri*. In early 2002, an international expedition finally found live specimens in Namibia. They located *Tyrannophasma gladiator* on the Brandberg Massif. They also found *Mantophasma zephyra* on the Erongoberg Massif.

There is a wide variety of species within this family. As of 2018, researchers had described 21 extant species. Many of these live in western South Africa and Namibia. For example, the Brandberg Massif is a modern center of endemism for them. In 2018, two new genera were discovered in the Richtersveld area of South Africa. These new groups are named *Kuboesphasma* and *Minutophasma*. Each of these new genera contains only a single species. Other notable genera include *Pachyphasma*, *Sclerophasma*, and *Austrophasma*. These names help scientists track the diversity of the family.

Fossils provide surprising facts about where these insects used to live. While they live in southern Africa today, they were once much more widespread. The presence of *Tanzaniophasma subsolana* in Tanzania suggests a larger ancient range. Fossil evidence from the Eocene period also supports this wider distribution. Some fossils have even been found in the Middle Jurassic of China. A genus called *Juramantophasma* was found in the Daohugou Bed. Other fossils, like *Adicophasma*, were found in Baltic amber. These ancient remains show that gladiators have survived for millions of years.

Studying Mantophasmatidae helps scientists understand complex biological classifications. There is an ongoing debate about how to group them. Some researchers, like Arillo and Engel, combine them with Grylloblattodea. They place both groups into a single order called Notoptera. Other scientists prefer to view them as two separate orders. In this view, they belong to a larger clade called Xenonomia. These different views show how much we are still learning. Every new discovery helps clarify the tree of life.