Operclipygus hospes (Lewis) is reported as a new record of Histeridae associated with buried bodies in the Neotropical region. It is also suggested that O. hospes has an important role in forensic entomology as a seasonal indicator. To assist in the recognition and the use of this species in forensic entomology, diagnosis and illustrations of the main characters of the genus and species are provided.

Revista Brasileira de Entomologia xxx (2015) xxx-xxx w w w . r b e n t o m o l o g i a . c o m a b s t r a c t A list of the Coleoptera of importance from Brazil, based on published records was compiled. The checklist contains 345 species of 16 families allocated to 16 states of the country. In addition, three species of two families are registered for the first time. The fauna of Coleoptera of forensic importance is still not entirely known and future collection efforts and taxonomic reviews could increase the number of known species considerably in the near future.

A entomologia médico-criminal é o ramo da entomologia forense que estuda os insetos e outros artrópodes que estão associados principalmente com crimes contra a vida e violações como negligência, maus-tratos e tráfico de drogas. Têm como uma de suas principais aplicações a estimativa do intervalo pós-morte (IPM), por meio do conhecimento da taxonomia, biologia e sucessão da fauna cadavérica. O primeiro registro da aplicação dessa ciência é do século XIII, na China, popularizando-se a partir do fim do século XIX, com o lançamento do livro de Mégnin. No Brasil, os estudos se iniciaram noséculo XX com Edgar Roquette-Pinto e Oscar Freire. Contudo, apenas nas últimas décadas houve um aumento no número de grupos de pesquisa sobre entomologia médico-criminal, o que provocou um aumento na quantidade de publicações relacionadas ao tema. Tais fatores corroboram para a maior credibilidade dessa ciência e a consequente interação entre o meio acadêmico e a polícia, o que torna sua utilização corriqueira em muitos países. Os diversos estudos em andamento em vários continentes visam à aquisição de dados para a fundamentação de uma entomologia médico-criminal aplicável ao cenário mundial, fato essencial para a criação de um banco de dados forense que poderá prover auxílio tanto para o meio acadêmico quanto para os peritos criminais.

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For all species, abiotic factors directly affect performance, survival and reproduction, and consequently, their geographic distribution. Species distribution models (SDMs) are important tools to predict the influence of abiotic factors in species distributions and has been more applied over the years. However, these models can be built under different algorithms and using different methods to select environmental predictors, which can lead to different results. Five different algorithms and two sets of environmental predictors were compared to predict the geographic distribution of the blowfly Sarconesia chlorogaster (Wiedemann) (Diptera: Calliphoridae). This species has several occurrence points and a considerable amount of biological data available, which makes S. chlorogaster a good model system to compare environmental predictors. Two sets of environmental predictors (mainly derived from temperature and humidity) were built, and the set based on the influence of abiotic variables on the ecophysiology of S. chlorogaster showed better results than the principal component analysis (PCA) approach using 19 climatic variables. We also employed five modeling algorithms-Envelope Score, Mahalanobis Distance, GARP, Support Vector Machines, and Maxent-and the latter two showed the best performances. The results indicate that temperature is the main factor shaping geographic distribution of S. chlorogaster through its effect on fitness. Furthermore, we showed that this species is mainly distributed in south, southeastern, and some northwestern and southwestern sites of South America. In addition, our results also predicted suitable areas in Ecuador and Colombia, countries without previous records.

Southern Brazil is unique due to its subtropical climate. Here, we report on the first forensic entomology case and the first record of Sarconesia chlorogaster (Wiedemann) in a human corpse in this region. Flies' samples were collected from a body indoors at 20°C. Four species were found, but only Chrysomya albiceps (Wiedemann) and S. chlorogaster were used to estimate the minimum postmortem interval (mPMI). The mPMI was calculated using accumulated degree hour (ADH) and developmental time. The S. chlorogaster puparium collected was light in color, so we used an experiment to establish a more accurate estimate for time since initiation of pupation where we found full tanning after 3 h. Development of C. albiceps at 20°C to the end of the third instar is 7.4 days. The mPMI based on S. chlorogaster (developmental time until the third instar with no more than 3 h of pupae development) was 7.6 days.