Integrative description of new giant pill-millipedes from southern Thailand (Diplopoda, Sphaerotheriida, Zephroniidae)

Abstract

Two new species of giant pill-millipedes, Zephronia viridisoma Rosenmejer & Wesener sp. nov. and Sphaerobelum aesculus Rosenmejer & Wesener sp. nov., are described based on museum samples from southern Thailand. Zephronia viridisoma sp. nov. comes from Khao Lak, while the type locality of S. aesculus sp. nov. is on Phuket Island. Both species are described integratively, combining light microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, multi-layer photography, micro-CT scans and genetic barcoding. Genetic barcoding was successfully conducted for holotypes of both new species, which could be added to a dataset of all published sequences of the family Zephroniidae, including all described species from Thailand, Laos and Cambodia up to 2020. Genetic barcoding of the COI gene revealed another female of S. aesculus sp. nov., 160 km east of the type locality. Both new species are genetically distant from all other Zephroniidae from Thailand and surrounding countries, showing uncorrected p-distances of 16.8–23.1%. A virtual cybertype of a paratype of Z. viridisoma sp. nov. was created and made publically accessible.

Figure 2 from: Srisonchai R, Sutcharit C, Likhitrakarn N (2021) The giant pill-millipede genus Zephronia Gray, 1832 from Thailand, with a redescription of Z. siamensis Hirst, 1907 and descriptions of three new species (Diplopoda, Sphaerotheriida, Zephroniidae). ZooKeys 1067: 19-56. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1067.72369

“…16). This pattern is also marked in Sphaerobelum species (S. aesculus Rosenmejer & Wesener, 2021(Rosenmejer et al 2021)) by its occurrence at 160 km east of the type locality. The species boundaries of Zephronia have been mostly based on several morphological features (Wongthamwanich et al 2012a;Semenyuk et al 2018;Wesener 2019).…”

Figure 5 from: Srisonchai R, Sutcharit C, Likhitrakarn N (2021) The giant pill-millipede genus Zephronia Gray, 1832 from Thailand, with a redescription of Z. siamensis Hirst, 1907 and descriptions of three new species (Diplopoda, Sphaerotheriida, Zephroniidae). ZooKeys 1067: 19-56. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1067.72369

“…Zephronia viridisoma Rosenmejer & Wesener, 2021in Rosenmejer et al 2021 Distribution and habitats. The type locality is in Thailand (Nakhon Si Thammarat Province, Sichon District, Khao Lark Waterfall, 9°03'"N, 99°47'"E).…”

“…Khao Lark Waterfall = Khao Lak = near Si Khit Waterfall. The material was collected from a dense jungle in limestone areas (Rosenmejer et al 2021).…”

New Thai giant pill-millipede species, with new genetic barcoding data (Diplopoda, Sphaerotheriida, Zephroniidae)

“…Of the five families representing Sphaerotheriida, Zephroniidae is the only family found in Southeast Asia (Wesener 2016). With only nine species of giant pill-millipedes known from Thailand, of which seven were described in 2021 (Rosenmejer et al 2021;Likhitrakarn et al 2021;), the number is still low compared to e.g. northeastern India, from which 22 species are known (Wesener 2015a).…”

“…Phylogenetic and distance analyses. The 22 new COI sequences were added to a dataset from a previous study, containing all published sequences of the Zephroniidae (at 06.2020) in addition to far-and near-outgroups (Rosenmejer et al 2021). All sequences were aligned in Bioedit (Hall 1999).…”