We provide here a checklist of the ants of French Guiana, an overseas department of France situated in northern South America, with a very low human population density and predominantly covered by old-growth tropical rainforests. Based on 165 scientific papers, specimens deposited in collections, and unpublished surveys, a total of 659 valid species and subspecies from 84 genera and 12 subfamilies is presented. Although far from complete, these numbers represent approximately 10% of the ant diversity known to occur in the Neotropical realm. Additionally, three ant genera and 119 species are reported for the first time for French Guiana. Finally, five species are recognized as erroneous records for the the department in the literature. This checklist significantly expands the basic knowledge of the ants in the Guiana Shield, one of the world’s most important biodiversity hotspots.

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The ant genus Prionopelta Mayr, 1866 is revised for the Neotropics. Morphological traits combined with geographical data led to the recognition of eight species, four of them described here as new: Prionopelta dubia sp. n., Prionopelta menininha sp. n., Prionopelta minuta sp. n., and Prionopelta tapatia sp. n. Prionopelta marthae Forel, 1909 is proposed as a new junior synonym of Prionopelta antillana Forel, 1909. External morphological descriptions of the worker caste for all species are provided, as well as for some of the males and queens, mostly described here for the first time. Identification keys for all known castes, distribution maps and high-resolution illustrations are supplied for all species.

Research findings in natural sciences need to be comparable and reproducible to effectively improve our understanding of ecological and behavioural patterns. In this sense, knowledge frontiers in biodiversity studies are directly tied to taxonomic research, especially in species-rich tropical regions. Here we analysed the taxonomic information available in 470 studies on Brazilian ant diversity published in the last 50 years. We aimed to quantify the proportion of studies that provide enough data to validate taxonomic identification, explore the frequency of studies that properly acknowledge their taxonomic background, and investigate the primary resources for ant identification in Brazil. We found that most studies on Brazilian ant diversity (73.6%) explicitly stated the methods used to identify their specimens. However, the proportion of papers that provide complete data for the repository institutions and vouchered specimens is vanishingly small (5.8%). Additionally, only 40.0% of the studies consistently presented taxon authorities and years of description, rarely referencing taxonomic publications correctly. In turn, the number of specialists and institutions consulted for ant identification in Brazil has increased in the last years, along with the number of studies that explicitly provide their taxonomic procedures for ant identification. Our findings highlight a shift between generations regarding the recognition of taxonomy as fundamental science, deepening our understanding of biodiversity.

Este trabajo contribuye al conocimiento básico de las hormigas poneroides y ectatomminas en fragmentos de bosque del piedemonte llanero, altillanura y la transición entre estas dos zonas en el departamento del Meta. Se generaron y compararon listas de especies de las tres localidades de estudio. Los muestreos se realizaron durante septiembre y noviembre del 2015 y febrero del 2016 mediante captura manual, trampas de caída y recolección de 1 m2 de hojarasca para su procesamiento en sacos Winkler. En total, se registraron 40 especies, 32 de ellas con nombre, pertenecientes a doce géneros y cuatro subfamilias. La riqueza y abundancia de especies tendió a disminuir desde el piedemonte llanero hacia la altillanura. Los resultados constituyen la mayor riqueza de hormigas poneroides y ectatominas reportadas para estas zonas. Se resalta la importancia de los fragmentos de bosque para la presencia de este grupo de hormigas, y la necesidad de incrementar estudios de línea base hacia la región de la Orinoquia Colombiana.