Handbook of Insect Biology

Insects are numerous usually small arthropod animals of the class Insecta, having an adult stage characterized by three pairs of legs and a body segmented into head, thorax, and abdomen and usually having two pairs of wings. Insects include the flies, crickets, mosquitoes, beetles, butterflies, and bees. Like other arthropods, an insect has a hard outer covering, or exoskeleton, a segmented body, and jointed legs. Adult insects typically have wings and are the only flying invertebrates. The body of the typical adult insect is divided into three distinct parts, the head, thorax, and abdomen. The exoskeleton is composed of a horny substance called chitin.