Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised Jun 12, 2026

Pthirus

Pthirus is a genus of lice. There are only two extant species, and they are the sole known members of the family Pthiridae. Pthirus gorillae infests gorillas, and Pthirus pubis afflicts humans, and is commonly known as the crab louse or pubic louse. The two species diverged some 3.3 million years ago.

Last revised
Jun 12, 2026
Read time
≈ 2 min
Length
556 w
Citations
11
Source
Pthirus
Pthirus gorillae
Pthirus pubis
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Clade: Pancrustacea
Class: Insecta
Order: Psocodea
Suborder: Troctomorpha
Infraorder: Phthiraptera
Parvorder: Anoplura
Family: Pthiridae
Ewing, 1929
Genus: Pthirus
Leach, 18151
Type species
Pediculus pubis2
Species
Synonyms
  • Phthirus Leach, 18173

Pthirus is a genus of lice. There are only two extant species, and they are the sole known members of the family Pthiridae.4 Pthirus gorillae infests gorillas,5 and Pthirus pubis afflicts humans, and is commonly known as the crab louse or pubic louse.6 The two species diverged some 3.3 million years ago.7

Since 1958 the generic name Pthirus has been spelled with pth rather than phth, despite this being based on a misspelling of the Greek-derived phthirus.38

A three-gene phylogeny (largely reproduced in a later phylogenomic analysis, which included fewer taxa of this genus) is:910

Polyplax serrata

Pediculus humanus capitis

Pediculus humanus humanus

0.8

Pediculus schaeffi

5.9

Pthirus pubis

Pthirus gorillae

2.9
16.2

Pedicinus hamadryas

Pedicinus badii

Pedicinus pictus

4.3
17.2
27.4
47.6

Labels below nodes are estimated divergence times (Mya).


References

References

  1. Brewster, David, ed. (1815). "Entomology". The Edinburgh Encyclopædia. Vol. 9. Edinburgh: Blackwood. p. 77. doi:10.5962/bhl.title.30911.
  2. Hemming, Francis, ed. (1957). "Direction 64. Addition to the Official List of Specific Names in Zoology (a) of the specific names of nineteen species belonging to the class Insecta, each of which is the type species of a genus, the name of which was placed on the Official List of Generic Names in Zoology in the period up to the end of 1936 and (B) of the specific names of three species belonging to the same class which are currently treated as senior Subjective synonyms of the names of such species". Opinions and Declarations Rendered by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature. 1E (4): 66.
  3. "Taxonomy of Human Lice". Phthiraptera.info. Archived from the original on April 14, 2020.
  4. Berenbaum, May R. (2009). The earwig's tail: a modern bestiary of multi-legged legends. Harvard University Press. p. 27. ISBN 978-0-674-03540-9.
  5. Reed, David L.; Light, Jessica E.; Allen, Julie M.; Kirchman, Jeremy J. (2007). "Pair of lice lost or parasites regained: the evolutionary history of anthropoid primate lice". BMC Biology. 5 (1) 7. Bibcode:2007BMCB....5....7R. doi:10.1186/1741-7007-5-7. PMC 1828715. PMID 17343749.
  6. Rapini, Ronald P.; Bolognia, Jean L.; Jorizzo, Joseph L. (2007). Dermatology. St. Louis, Missouri: Mosby. ISBN 978-1-4160-2999-1.
  7. Weiss, RA (2009). "Apes, lice and prehistory". J. Biol. 8 (2): 20. doi:10.1186/jbiol114. PMC 2687769. PMID 19232074.
  8. Hemming, Francis, ed. (1957). "Direction 63. Completion and in certain Cases correction of entries relating to the names of genera belonging to the class Insecta made in the Official List of Generic Names in Zoology in the period up to the end of 1936". Opinions and Declarations Rendered by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature. 1E (3): 32.
  9. Light, JE; Smith, VS; Allen, JM; Durden, LA; Reed, DL (22 September 2010). "Evolutionary history of mammalian sucking lice (Phthiraptera: Anoplura)". BMC Evolutionary Biology. 10: 292. Bibcode:2010BMCEE..10..292L. doi:10.1186/1471-2148-10-292. PMC 2949877. PMID 20860811.
  10. de Moya, Robert S; Yoshizawa, Kazunori; Walden, Kimberly K O; Sweet, Andrew D; Dietrich, Christopher H; Kevin P, Johnson (2021-06-16). Buckley, Thomas (ed.). "Phylogenomics of Parasitic and Nonparasitic Lice (Insecta: Psocodea): Combining Sequence Data and Exploring Compositional Bias Solutions in Next Generation Data Sets". Systematic Biology. 70 (4): 719–738. doi:10.1093/sysbio/syaa075. ISSN 1063-5157. PMID 32979270.
External links
  • Data related to Pthirus at Wikispecies