Bahiahelea

Borkent, Art, 2024, The Phylogeny of the Genera of Biting Midges (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae) of the World, Zootaxa 5438 (1), pp. 1-274 : 231

Bahiahelea :

- Male parameres fused medially into a large, spherical structure, with a short apical fork (likely the apices of the otherwise fused parameres), unique in the Culicomorpha. This feature was previously presented by Borkent (1995: character 49).

- Female abdomen with slender horseshoe-shaped sclerite between the medially separated halves of abdominal sternite 9. This pigmented structure may be present in some other taxa as a translucent structure and further study is warranted regarding homologies. Regardless, this is the only taxon with such a pigmented feature, other than Bothahelea where it is only slightly curved.

- Borkent (1995, character 50; very large segment 10) and Borkent et al. (2008b, character 9; sternite 9 much longer than gonocoxite) identified these as autapomorphies of this genus. Here the modification of segment 9 is considered a synapomorphy shared with Parabezziini new genus (character 112).