Abstract

We summarized distributional information of medically important insects from 76 families and 4531 genera occurring worldwide. The continents were divided into 67 basic geographical units. Using a new similarity formula and a new clustering method for quantitative analysis, 67 basic geographical units were clustered into 7 large unit groups and 20 small unit groups. The results were superior to the traditional single linkage method, average group linkage method, or sum of squares method. The cluster results were similar with the result of mainly phytophagous insects 104,344 genera in the world, but were different from the Wallace#x2019;s mammal geographical division scheme. Based on these seemingly contradictory results, we infer that animals, insect and plants may have the same distribution pattern and that it is necessary to conduct precise quantitative analysis for animals and plants worldwide.