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Drosophila is a genus of small flies, belonging to the family Drosophilidae, whose members are often called "fruit flies" or more appropriately vinegar flies, wine flies, pomace flies, grape flies, and picked fruit-flies, a reference to the characteristic of many species to linger around overripe or rotting fruit. A second, related fly family, the Tephritidae, are also called fruit flies; these feed primarily on unripe or ripe fruit, with many species being regarded as destructive agricultural pests, especially the Mediterranean fruit fly. One species of Drosophila in particular, D. melanogaster, has been heavily used in research in genetics and is a common model organism in developmental biology. Indeed, the terms "fruit fly" and "Drosophila" are often used synonymously with D. melanogaster in modern biological literature. The entire genus, however, contains about 1,500 species and is very diverse in appearance, behavior, and breeding habitat. Scientists who research Drosophila are often called Drosophilists. The term "Drosophila", meaning "dew-loving", is a modern scientific Latin adaptation from Greek words d??s??, drósos, "dew", and f????, phílos, "loving" with the Latin feminine suffix -a. Several Drosophila species, including D. melanogaster, D. immigrans, and D. simulans, are closely associated with humans, and are often referred to as domestic species. These and other species (D. subobscura, Zaprionus indianus) have been accidentally introduced around the world by human activities such as fruit transports. Males of this genus are known to have the longest sperm cells of any organism on Earth, including one species, Drosophila bifurca, that have sperm that are 5.8 centimetres long.[1] The cells are mostly tail, and are delivered to the females in tangled coils. The other members of the genus Drosophila also make relatively few giant sperm cells, with D. bifurca's being the longest.[2] D. melanogaster sperm cells are a more modest 1.8 millimetres long, although this is still about 300 times as long as a human sperm.
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