Vollenhovia nipponica

This species is a workerless inquiline parasitising.

Distribution based on Regional Taxon Lists
Nearctic Region: United States. Palaearctic Region: Japan.

Genetics
The genome of P. nipponica was sequenced for a study examining how this and other parasitic ants with no worker caste may have altered their genome to arrive at a workerless state. In comparison to ants with a full complement of castes, there appeared to be no loss of genes in the parasitic ants. This suggests regulatory differences and not sequence differences predominate in gains and losses of castes (phenotypes). (Smith et al. 2015)

Castes
Queen described as brachypterous (Ohkawara and Satoh 2015)

Nomenclature

 *  nipponica. Vollenhovia nipponica Kinomura & Yamauchi, 1992: 203, figs. 1, 2 (q.m.) JAPAN.

References based on Global Ant Biodiversity Informatics

 * Harada Y., K. Nishikubo, K. Matsumoto, M. Matsuda, Y. Inazawa, Y. Ozono, S. Koto, N. Kawaguchi, and S. Yamane. 2011. Ant fauna of Japanese beech (Fagus crenata) forests in southwestern Japan. Bull. Biogeogr. Soc. Japan 66: 115-127.
 * Kinomura K., and K. Yamauchi. 1992. A new workerless socially parasitic species of the genus Vollenhovia (Hymenoptera, Formicidae) from Japan. Jpn. J. Entomol. 60: 203-206.
 * Kobayashi K., H. Tamura, M. Okamoto, E. Hasegawa, K. Ohkawara. 2012. Phylogenetic relationships among populations of Vollenhovia ants, with particular focus on the evolution of wing morphology. Annals of the Entomological Society of America 105(3):454-461.
 * Minato M., T. Kameyama, F. Ito, and T. Itino. 1996. A preliminary report of ant fauna in Gagawa Prefecture. Ari 20: 9-13.
 * Terayama M. 1992. Structure of ant communities in East Asia. A. Regional differences and species richness. Bulletin of the Bio-geographical Society of Japan 47: 1-31.
 * Terayama M., K. Ogata, and B.M. Choi. 1994. Distribution records of ants in 47 prefectures of Japan. Ari (report of the Myrmecologists Society of Japan) 18: 5-17.