myrmicine

comparative more myrmicine · superlative most myrmicine

1. biologyOf or pertaining to the ant subfamily Myrmicinae.

   The chemistry of the myrmicine genus Solenopsis is so aberrant that it reduces generalizations about ant venoms to the absurd.

   2012, Murry Blum, Chemical Defenses of Arthropods, page 329

   2 more examples

   These data have been accumulated from the study of the specialized Myrmicine and Formicine ants of Europe and North America [...]

   1885, William Morton Wheeler, Collected Papers, volume 1, page 27

   The discovery of tandem calling with pheromones in Leptothorax throws considerable light on the evolution of chemical recruitment techniques in myrmicine ants generally.

   1990, Bert Hölldobler, Edward O. Wilson, The Ants, page 274

2. biologyOf or pertaining to the ant genus Myrmica.

plural myrmicines

1. biologyAny ant of the subfamily Myrmicinae.

   Subfamily Myrmicinae […]Species of myrmicines are most likely to be confused with species of Leptanilla or Tetraponera because of the two-segmented petiole.

   1999, Steven O. Shattuck, Australian Ants: Their Biology and Identification, volume 3, page 122

   2 more examples

   The other dominant ant subfamilies were also present but with lesser importance (fig. 1.4). Toward the end of the ponerine expansion (Early Eocene), the myrmicines began to radiate, surpassing the ponerines in biomass and diversity.

   2007, Victor Rico-Gray, Paulo S. Oliveira, The Ecology and Evolution of Ant-Plant Interactions, page 12

   The pseudomyrmecines can only be mistaken for myrmicines, but in the former there is always a fully developed promesonotal suture that is fully articulated and flexible in fresh specimens—a character that is always absent from myrmicines.

   2016, Brian L. Fisher, Barry Bolton, Ants of Africa and Madagascar: A Guide to the Genera, page 56