Tasked to defend the colony from attackers, the specialised soldier caste in some termite species has evolved various impressive mechanisms, including plug-like heads – meant to block intruding ants trying to invade their lairs, and mouthparts designed to bite and pierce.
Still, there are even more spectacular soldiers, such as a recently discovered drywood termite species, whose unique long and slender, stick-like snapping mandibles produce one of the highest acceleration speeds measured in a living organism. Rather than bite, these peculiar ‘jaws’ deliver powerful strikes at enemies bold enough to stand in the way of the soldier termite and its colony.
The scientists describe the new termite’s specialty in detail:
“Roisinitermes employs a unique strategy of snapping, achieved by long and slender mandibles pressed against each other in a defensive encounter. When this potential energy is released, the left mandible springs over the right and the resultant snap is forced onto the opponent if it is in the path of the strike.”
Discovered in Cameroon, this striking species is the first drywood termite found to rely on snapping mandibles as a defense strategy. Given that until now there had been a single subfamily (Termitinae) known to have developed such, the very existence of the new insect poses a whole new set of questions before scientists. Have snapping mandibles evolved independently in two evolutionary lineages? Or, is it that these groups share a distant kin relationship which has gone unnoticed for that long?
The new drywood termite, which is also assigned to a new genus, is named Roisinitermes ebogoensis, and is described in the open access journal ZooKeys by an international team of researchers, led by Dr Rudolf Scheffrahn of the Institute for Food and Agricultural Sciences at University of Florida, Davie, USA. Although this particular species is not thought to be a pest, some drywood termites cause serious damage to wooden structures around the world.
Both colonies studied by the scientists were found near the Ebogo II village, which also stands behind the name of the species. The first unusual colony to draw the attention of the scientists was collected from a forest on an island in the Nyong River, where it lived in a thin (3 cm) and long (over 3 m) broad-leaf tree branch suspended from a canopy. The second one – in a 15-mm thick dead liana branch hanging from a tree in a nearly pristine rainforest.
The team expects that future research will shed more light on the origins and evolution of the newly discovered termite.
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Original source:
Scheffrahn RH, Bourguignon T, Akama PD, Sillam-Dussès D, Šobotník J (2018) Roisinitermes ebogoensis gen. & sp. n., an outstanding drywood termite with snapping soldiers from Cameroon (Isoptera, Kalotermitidae). ZooKeys 787: 91-105. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.787.28195
Post originally published by the California Academy of Sciences
Named for Aphrodite, Greek goddess of love and beauty, a new species of fish enchants Academy scientists
On a recent expedition to the remote Brazilian archipelago of St. Paul’s Rocks, a new species of reef fish—striped a vivid pink and yellow—enchanted its diving discoverers from the California Academy of Sciences.
First spotted at a depth of 400 feet beneath the ocean’s surface, this cryptic fish inhabits rocky crevices of twilight zone reefs and is found nowhere else in the world. Upon discovery, the deep-diving team was so captivated by their finned find that they didn’t notice a massive sixgill shark hovering above them in an exciting moment captured on camera. The new fish description published today in Zookeys.
“This is one of the most beautiful fishes I’ve ever seen,” says Dr. Luiz Rocha, the Academy’s Curator of Fishes and co-leader of the Hope for Reefs initiative. “It was so enchanting it made us ignore everything around it.”
The sixgill shark stretched nearly ten feet long and cruised overhead as Rocha and post-doctoral fellow Dr. Hudson Pinheiro delicately collected the fish for further study back at the Academy. Behind the camera, the team’s diving officer Mauritius Bell enthusiastically announced the behemoth visitor to the duo, but to no avail. Aptly named, Tosanoides aphrodite enchanted its discoverers much like Aphrodite, Greek goddess of love and beauty, enchanted the ancient Greek gods.
“Fishes from the twilight zone tend to be pink or reddish in color,” says Pinheiro. “Red light doesn’t penetrate to these dark depths, rendering the fishes invisible unless illuminated by a light like the one we carry while diving.”
Back at the Academy, laboratory and collections manager Claudia Rocha helped the diving duo describe the new species: Males are outfitted with alternating pink and yellow stripes while females sport a solid, blood-orange color. Using a microscope, the team counted fins and measured spine length; DNA analysis revealed the new species is the first Atlantic-dwelling member of its genus.
Male specimen of the new species (Tosanoides aphrodite). Photo by LA Rocha.
The new denizen of the deep is a remarkable testament to the vast ocean habitats that still remain unexplored. Rocha and Pinheiro are part of a deep-diving research team that ventures to twilight zone reefs—mysterious coral habitats stretching across a narrow band of ocean 200 – 500 feet beneath the surface. In these deep reefs, animals live in partial darkness—beyond recreational diving limits, yet above the deep trenches patrolled by submarines and ROVs. As part of its Hope for Reefs initiative, the Academy team and their collaborators are exploring this unknown frontier with the help of high-tech equipment like closed-circuit rebreathers that allow scientists to extend their research time underwater.
Nearly 600 miles offshore the coast of Brazil, St. Paul’s Rocks is so remote that it required the team to utilize the research vessel M/V Aluciaas their homebase to explore the archipelago. The rocky outcroppings are extensions of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge—an active, tectonic plate boundary—puncturing the ocean’s surface. Given the region’s unique geology and isolated location, many of the species that live there are found nowhere else on Earth. Through their research, the Hope for Reefs team is finding that twilight zone habitats also host many location-specific species.
In a recent landmark paper, the team found that twilight zone reefs are unique ecosystems bursting with life and are just as vulnerable to climate change threats as their shallow counterparts. Their findings upended the long-standing assumption that species might migrate between habitats to avoid human-related stressors. As documented in the footage from this new fish’s discovery, a piece of fishing line can be seen streaming behind the sixgill shark—evidence that human impacts extend to depth too.
“In a time of global crisis for coral reefs, learning more about unexplored reef habitats and their colorful residents is critical to our understanding of how to protect them,” says Rocha. “We aim to highlight the ocean’s vast and unexplored wonders and inspire a new generation of sustainability champions.”
Research article:
Pinheiro HT, Rocha C, Rocha LA (2018) Tosanoides aphrodite, a new species from mesophotic coral ecosystems of St. Paul’s Rocks, Mid Atlantic Ridge (Perciformes, Serranidae, Anthiadinae). ZooKeys 786: 105-115. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.786.27382
In 2010, moth collector James Vargo began finding numerous specimens of a hitherto unknown pygmy moth in his light traps on his property in Indiana, USA. When handed to Erik van Nieukerken, researcher at Naturalis Biodiversity Center (Leiden, the Netherlands) and specialist in pygmy moths (family Nepticulidae), the scientist failed to identify it as a previously known species.
These are male specimens of the studied leaf mining moth Stigmella multispicata collected from Iowa, USA.
Then, Erik found a striking similarity of the DNA barcodes with those of a larva he had recently collected on Siberian elm in Beijing’s botanical garden. At the time, the Chinese specimen could not be identified either.
In October 2015, Daniel Owen Gilrein, entomologist at Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County (New York, USA), received samples of green caterpillars seen to descend en masse from Siberian elm trees in Sagaponack, New York. He also received leafmines from the same trees.
Once they joined forces, the researchers did not take long to find out that the specimens from James Vargo and the caterpillars from New York belonged to one and the same species. The only thing left was its name.
Following further investigation, the scientists identified the moth as Stigmella multispicata – a pygmy moth described in 2014 from Primorye, Russia, by the Lithuanian specialists Agne Rociene and Jonas Stonis.
“Apparently, this meant that we were dealing with a recent invasion from East Asia into North America,” explains Erik.
Once the researchers had figured out how to identify the leafminer, they were quick to spot its existence in plenty of collections and occurrence reports from websites, such as BugGuide and iNaturalist.
With the help of Charley Eiseman, a naturalist from Massachusetts specializing in North American leafminers, the authors managed to conclude the moth’s existence in ten US states and two Canadian provinces. In most cases, the species was found on or near Siberian elm – another species transferred from Asia to North America.
Their study is published in the open access journal ZooKeys.
Despite the oldest records dating from 2010, it turned out that the species had already been well established at the time. The authors suspect that the spread has been assisted by transport of plants across nurseries.
“Even though Stigmella multispicata does not seem to be a real problem, it would be a good idea to follow its invasion over North America, and to monitor whether the species may also attack native elm species,” the researchers point out.
Distribution in North America.
Interestingly, in addition to the newly identified moth, the Siberian elms in North America have been struggling with another, even more common, invasive leafminer from Asia: the weevil species Orchestes steppensis. The beetle had been previously misnamed as the European elm flea weevil.
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Original source:
van Nieukerken EJ, Gilrein DO, Eiseman CS (2018) Stigmella multispicata Rociene & Stonis, an Asian leafminer on Siberian elm, now widespread in eastern North America (Lepidoptera, Nepticulidae). ZooKeys 784: 95-125. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.784.27296
As many as twenty-one species of parasitoid wasps are described as new to science, following the first ever revision of their genus since its establishment back in 1893.
The study simultaneously updates the count of species within the genus (Chromoteleia) to 27 in total, produces a systematic revision of the world’s representatives of this group of wasps, expands their biogeographic knowledge, and clarifies their generic concept.
The monograph is published in the open access journal ZooKeys by a team of US and Canadian scientists, led by Hua-yan Chen, graduate student at the Ohio State University.
The wasps in the genus Chromoteleia are easily distinguished thanks to their large size in combination with their vivid colouration. Compared to other species in the family of platygastrid wasps, which normally measure merely 1 – 2 mm in length, the species in the studied genus range between 3 and 9 mm. Their uncommonly large, robust and elongated bodies is why the scientists assume that these wasps likely parasitise the eggs of orthopterans, such as grasshoppers, crickets and katydids.
A focal point in the study is the intriguing distribution of the wasps. While the genus is widespread throughout continental Mesoamerica, Central America and South America, and its distribution ranges from the Mexican state of Jalisco in the north all the way to Itapúa Department in Paraguay and Paraná in southern Brazil, the species C. congoana is a lone representative of the genus in Africa.
The ‘lone’ African representative of the genus, Chromoteleia congoana.
While dispersal from South America to Africa has been observed in the past in another genus of parasitoid wasps (Kapala), the scientists are not willing to reject the possibility of Chromoteleia wasps having been widely distributed across the Old World during a previous geological epoch. Such phenomenon, also known as a relict population, would not mean that the wasp group has subsequently ‘conquered’ the Neotropics and current species inhabiting the New World are rather remainders of once widespread insects.
Chen H-y, Talamas EJ, Valerio AA, Masner L, Johnson NF (2018) Revision of the World species of the genus Chromoteleia Ashmead (Hymenoptera, Platygastridae, Scelioninae). ZooKeys 778: 1-95. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.778.25775
A new species of African pygmy toad was discovered during an expedition in 2016 to Angola’s second highest peak, the Serra da Neve Inselberg.
This small toad is distinct among its close relatives in lacking ears, though other more distantly related toads also lack ears. The new species is named Poyntonophrynus pachnodes, with the species name “pachnodes” being Greek for “frosty” in reference to both the name of the mountain (“Mountain of Snow” in Portuguese) and the cool temperatures at the higher elevations where it is found (nearly 1,500 m or 5000 ft above sea level).
After spending three weeks in the field, the scientists returned from Angola to study the collected amphibians and reptiles through a combination of genetic and anatomical techniques.
The team used DNA sequences to determine the relationship of the new earless species to other African toad species. They also used high-resolution computed tomography scanning (CT scanning) to look at the skeletons of these frogs and determine the extent of ear loss.
While closely related to other pygmy toads, the new species from Serra da Neve was found to lack both external and internal parts of the ear related to hearing in other frogs and toads. The combination of genetic and anatomical information shows that this new pygmy toad recently evolved from an ancestor that had a completely formed ear.
CT-scan of the new species
The discovery and description of a new species of toad found only in the mountains of Angola is surprising. Most frogs and toads prefer moist environments such as lowland tropical rainforests or cool montane forests and grasslands.
In contrast, most African pygmy toad species can be found in the arid region of southwestern Africa, encompassed by Angola and Namibia. With the addition of this new species, there are now five pygmy toad species present exclusively in this region. Other species are found across other dry regions in southern and eastern Africa.
While most groups of African frogs are not rich in species in this region, the affinity for arid environments in African pygmy toads is more similar to groups of lizards, many of which have a number of species present only in this area.
Namibe Province is among the better-explored regions of Angola, but little is known of the species found on its isolated mountains, or inselbergs. The Serra da Neve Inselberg is of special interest because of its isolation from other mountains, which allows for the evolution of unique species, such as the new pygmy toad. The recent field research at Serra da Neve and the discovery of this new species of toad contribute to this mountain being considered a priority for conservation in the near future.
The new species is small (less than 31 mm in length) and coppery brown in colour. It lives among the rocks and leaves in dry open forests on Serra da Neve. While otherwise similar to other pygmy toads, the lack of ears makes this species distinct among its near relatives. It is unknown whether this species has a mating call and how it might hear. Many other frogs, including many species of toads, have also lost their ears over evolutionary time.
The discovery of this new species highlights the Serra da Neve as a potentially important center for Angolan biodiversity, but also suggests that African pygmy toads warrant further attention from scientists interested in the evolutionary loss of ears.
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Original source:
Ceríaco LMP, Marques MP, Bandeira S, Agarwal I, Stanley EL, Bauer AM, Heinicke MP, Blackburn DC (2018) A new earless species of Poyntonophrynus (Anura, Bufonidae) from the Serra da Neve Inselberg, Namibe Province, Angola. ZooKeys 780: 109-136. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.780.25859
It happened again, a previously unknown spider species, whose home is a strongly humanised European country, appears to have been quietly and patiently waiting to get noticed until very recently.
Living on the trunks of oaks in Spain, the new species would have probably been spotted decades ago, had it not been for its sophisticated camouflage, which allows the small arachnid to perfectly blend with the lichens naturally growing on the tree.
Curiously enough, this is the same habitat, where the team found another new spider in 2016.
“How many new species remain unknown in these isolated oaks that once formed vast forests now becomes one even more intriguing question,” say the researchers.
“Anyone going for a walk around any village or park in central Spain would have been close to the new species. However, noticing it requires not only curiosity, but also a good sight, as its lichen-like colours make up an excellent mimicry.”
Lichens growing on an oak trunk at the study site in central Spain.
The similarity between the adults and the lichens that cover the oak trunks they inhabit is remarkable. Meanwhile, the greenish juveniles live amongst the green new shoots in the oak canopy until they reach maturity.
Whether the spider uses its mimicry to avoid predators or rather surprise its prey remains open for further investigation.
The description of this new species that belongs to the popular group of orb-weavers once again stresses the need of working harder on completing the list of spiders living in the Old World, such as the countries in the Mediterranean basin – a region that certainly keeps more taxonomic surprises up his sleeve.
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Original source:
Morano E, Bonal R (2018) Araneus bonali sp. n., a novel lichen-patterned species found on oak trunks (Araneae, Araneidae). ZooKeys 779: 119-145. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.779.26944
A new species of beetle with remarkably long genitalia that hint at a curious evolutionary “sexual arms race” has been described from Malaysian Borneo.
The new insect was named after actress and biologist Isabella Rossellini in honour of her stage shows and Webby Award-winning series of films about animal reproduction, featured on SundanceTV.
The new species, Ptomaphaginus isabellarossellini, finds a place among the 30 known species of round fungus beetles (subfamily Cholevinae) recorded by the authors from the island of Borneo. Of these, there are a total of 14 which had remained unknown to science until now.
The reason why the scientists named this particular species after the famous actress is its genitalia. The beetle’s penis carries a long, whip-like thread, called flagellum, whereas the female has a similarly long tube leading up to a sperm storage organ.
Lead author Menno Schilthuizen, who himself has previously released a simultaneously educative and entertaining book about the evolution of genitals, says that such exaggerated male and female genitalia often betray an “evolutionary sexual arms race”.
On the male side, natural selection favours longer genitalia because of the ability to directly reach the female’s sperm storage organ. However, female beetles would rather retain their right to favour the DNA of a certain mate over the rest. The upshot is that, over long periods of evolution, penises get longer and vaginas get deeper. Similar evolutionary genital exaggeration is also known in rove beetles and ducks.
“This is better than winning the Oscar,” says honoured Isabella Rossellini.
The Italian-born actress, filmmaker, author, philanthropist, and model has even featured the new beetle in her new Link Link Circus stage shows. Dealing with animal behaviour, the series will be touring theaters in Europe this fall.
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Original source:
Schilthuizen M, Perreau M, Njunjic I (2018) A review of the Cholevinae from the island of Borneo (Coleoptera, Leiodidae). ZooKeys 777: 57-108. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.777.23212
Worldwide, Mexico is well-known for a lot of things: its cuisine, tequila, mariachis, pyramids, and beaches, as well as being the country with the most Spanish-speaking residents (more than 120 million people).
In contrast, however, little is known for the country’s chondrichthyan fauna: a class of fishes containing the sharks, chimaeras, rays, and skates.
To fill the gap in the knowledge of the Mexican marine fauna, scientists from the Instituto Politécnico Nacional – Centro Interdisciplinario de Ciencias Marinas (IPN-CICIMAR) conducted a multidisciplinary study on the extant species of the country’s Economic Exclusive Zone (EEZ) and, as a result, reported a total of 217 extant chondrichthyan species. Their findings are published in the open access journal ZooKeys.
In their updated taxonomic list, the team of Dr. José De La Cruz-Agüero, Dr. Jorge Guillermo Chollet-Villalpando, and Venezuelan graduate students Lorem González-González and Nicolás R. Ehemann report eight chimaeras, 111 sharks and 98 ray and skate species. These numbers equate to 18% of the world’s chondrichthyans.
Split between the Mexican coasts there are 92 species recorded from the Mexican Pacific and the Gulf of California, whereas 94 fishes are identified for the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. Additionally, 31 species are known from both coasts.
“The species richness will undoubtedly continue to increase, due to the current investigations in progress, as well as the exploration of deep-water fishing areas in the EEZ,” comment the scientists.
Considered to be primitive fishes, sharks, skates, chimaeras, and rays are believed to have been inhabiting the planet for the last 420-450 million years. To put it in perspective, the earliest evidence of our species – Homo sapiens – is pretty ‘young’ at 315,000 years.
Not only do these species are peculiar with their lack of a bony skeleton when compared to the more recently evolved fishes, but they also have an unusual digestive system, featuring a spiral valve, where the lower intestine is twisted like a corkscrew to increase the surface area. They don’t have a swimming bladder either. Further, there are about 650 extant species, whereas the known bony fishes are estimated to be over 35,000.
As if to make matters worse, these fishes are also particularly susceptible to overfishing and have a low rate of growth and fecundity (females give birth to between 1 and 25 pups a year).
Original source:
Ehemann NR, González-González LV, Chollet-Villalpando JG, Cruz-Agüero JDL (2018) Updated checklist of the extant Chondrichthyes within the Exclusive Economic Zone of Mexico. ZooKeys 774: 17-39. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.774.25028
Thanks to their conspicuous structures, the mollusks have been added to a brand new species group of land snails to be commonly known as the ‘scaly’ snails, so that they can be set apart from the rest in the genus Georissa. Why it is that only some of the species in the genus sport the unique ‘scales’, remains unknown.
Fascinated with the minute ‘scaly’ snail fauna of Borneo, the researchers carried out fieldwork between 2015 and 2017 to find out how these curious shells evolved. In addition, they also examined material deposited in museum and private snail collections.
Apart from DNA data, which is nowadays commonly used in species identification, the team turned to yet-to-become-popular modern tools such as 3D modelling, conducted through X-ray scanning. By doing so, the researchers managed to look at both the inner and outer surfaces of the shells of the tiny specimens from every angle and position, and examine them in great detail.
The researchers note that to identify the ‘scaly’ snails to species level, one needs a combination of both DNA and morphological data:
“Objective species delimitation based solely on molecular data will not be successful for the ‘scaly’ snails in Georissa, at least if one wishes for the taxonomy to reflect morphology as well.”
The six new species are all named after the localities they have been originally collected from, in order to create awareness for species and habitat conservation.
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Watch rotation and cross-section of the 3D models of the studied species here.
Original source:
Khalik MZ, Hendriks K, Vermeulen JJ, Schilthuizen M (2018) A molecular and conchological dissection of the “scaly” Georissa of Malaysian Borneo (Gastropoda, Neritimorpha, Hydrocenidae). ZooKeys 773: 1-55. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.773.24878
So here we are, 10 years from that very first issue of ours published on a very special date – the 4th of July – and the result of a seemingly ordinary breakfast conversation between two respected entomologists, Prof Lyubomir Penev and Dr Terry Erwin, during the Entomological Society of America meeting in San Diego, USA, seven months earlier.
Then and there, under the California sun, an idea about a brand new taxonomic journal meant to revolutionise the scholarly publishing in zoology – in terms of both openness and technological innovation, was born. The rest, like they say, is history.
Ten years in, we stand as the most prolific open-access journal in zoology with a total of 4,103 published articles, 45 newly described animal families, 650 genera and 8977 species, authored by a total of 5,720 researchers coming from 131 different countries. We also take pride in having set an excellent example for the rest of the academic titles in Pensoft’s already extensive portfolio of open access journals.
Find more about our achievements and milestones in our special Editorial, authored by Editor-in-Chief Dr Terry Erwin, founder Prof Lyubomir Penev and Managing editor Prof Pavel Stoev as part of our anniversarial 770th journal issue.
In the present blog post, we’ll take the opportunity to look back on ZooKeys’ top appearances on ‘the big scene’, because we believe it’s nothing but our shared fondness and homage to the kingdom of animals which has brought us here. Most importantly, it’s also the key to getting to know, save and protect our planet’s priceless biodiversity.
Here are some cool displays of ZooKeys-inspired zoo-affection to remember:
The Hollywood-worthy beauty from the photos turned the heads of professional taxonomists in such a way that, with the help of citizen scientists, the team of Dr Shaun Winterton, California Department of Food & Agriculture tracked down the insect all the way to Sabah, Malaysia, to subsequently describe it as a species new to science in 2012.
Beyond all our furriest dreams, in a world where everybody thought humans have found every single animal they’d like to add on their ‘To-pet’ wishlists, the smaller and, to be honest, cuter sibling of the tree-dwelling olingos had remained undercover up until 2013, when Prof. Kristofer M. Helgen of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, and his team described the species Bassaricyon neblina, better known as the Olinguito.
This is a baby Olinguito, a new carnivorous mammal discovered in Colombia this year. pic.twitter.com/45oJNfJVkM
Surprise, surprise: as a result, there’s now a special World Olinguito Day (look up #WorldOlinguitoDay on Twitter), which the world we’ll be celebrating for the fifth time around next month, on 15th of August.
A bit less cuddly is the next spectacular species, which is also a first for science.
Photo courtesy: Somsak Panha
While centipedes can be found at various habitats, ranging from rainforests to deserts and pitch-black caves, Scolopendra cataracta still manages to impress with its unique taste for… water, as well as its giant size of up to 20 cm in length.
In fact, the species, described by the team of Dr Warut Siriwut, Chulalongkorn University, is the very first known amphibious centipede.
Moreover, it swims “powerfully like an eel,” George Beccaloni, who spotted the striking arthropod during his honeymoon in Thailand in 2001, told National Geographic.
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“Nah, they’re just big teddy bears,” smiles tarantula expert Dr Chris Hamilton, when the Sky News’ presenter asks him whether his latest discovery is in any way dangerous, after seeing her interviewee drop the black spider on camera, during their LIVE Skype chat.
Video source: Newsy: https://www.newsy.com/
The reason why the “laid back” tarantula, described as Aphonopelma johnnycashi got all that attention, however, was the undeniable and all too curious similarities between the arachnid and its famous namesake, the singer-songwriter Johnny Cash.
The Johnny Cash tarantula happened to be discovered in California, precisely near Folsom Prison – the place from Cash’s famous song “Folsom Prison Blues”. Further, the all-black males of the species are reminiscent of the singer’s nickname – ‘The Man in Black’.
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At one hand, rupturing one own’s body apart in what could be best described as ‘an explosion’, so that a toxic liquid is shot into the enemy when confronted, might sound as a vicious act of violence.
Photo courtesy: Alexey Kopchinskiy
However, in social insects like the ants, and, more specifically, in a species of the so-called ‘exploding ants’, aptly named Colobopsis explodens, this is merely the way the minor worker caste of infertile females contributes to its colony when its survival is at stake.
Did you see the video? No wonder it got everyone fascinated (including kids such as this young charming lady here!) enough to have the hashtag #ExplodingAnts become a thing on Twitter.
To protect threatened with extinction species, we first need to learn about their existence. We’ve been hearing this a lot.
Photo courtesy: Vazrick Nazari
However, it’s easy to think of the fluffy olinguito if you happen to be someone responsible for the conservation of the montane rainforest of the Colombian and Ecuadorian Andes, for example.
But how do you draw the attention of the public and policy makers to a tiny and rarely seen species of moth living in a limited and highly populated and disturbed patch of land shared between the states of California, USA, and Baja California, Mexico?
Metrics available from Altmetric. The numbers account for publications from across online sources (i.e. news outlets, social media, blogs etc.) which cite the DOI link of the article. Check out detailed data in real time.
Simply name it after the US President-to-be, is what entomologist Dr. Vazrick Nazari must’ve thought while deciding on the name of his lepidopteran discovery, going by the name of Neopalpa donaldtrumpi.
“It inhabits endangered dune habitats – very fragile – and should be protected, the kind of motivation I needed to name it after Trump,” the scientist tells BBC Radio 5.
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As a final for our special anniversarial blog post, we’ve kept a few record-breakers. Who doesn’t love to be in first place, after all?
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Fitting about 10 times within the eye of a needle, the 0.86-millimetre Angustopila dominikae, known from China, became the world’s smallest land snail species when Dr Barna Páll-Gergely, Shinshu University, published it in ZooKeyson 28th September, 2015.
Photo courtesy: Dr. Barna Páll-Gergely and Nikolett Szpisjak
Yet, its fame wasn’t meant to last.
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It took only about a month for Acmella nana to steal the spotlight thanks to its even tiniest measures of 0.70 mm. The Malaysian species was described in ZooKeys by Prof Dr Menno Schilthuizen, Naturalis Biodiversity Center, and his team in addition to other 47 species, including endemic snails known from single localities, on 2nd November, 2015.
Photo courtesy: Menno Schilthuizen
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As if themed “The Year of the Smallest”, it was also at the end of 2015 when the smallest known free-living insect, called Scydosella musawasensis, was published with ZooKeys.
Photo courtesy: Alexey Polilov
To describe the 0.325-millimetre species, discoverer Dr. Alexey Polilov, Lomonosov Moscow State University, had to leave behind the preserved specimens and collect new material from the Chicaque National Park, Colombia, and, then, use a specialised software and digital micrographs to provide the exact measures.
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Fortunately, the world-record setters didn’t abandon ZooKeys with the conclusion of 2015.
In early 2016, we published the deepest-dwelling centipede, Geophilus hadesi, discovered in Croatia by the team of our Managing editor, Prof Pavel Stoev.
Photo courtesy: J. Bedek
Living at depths of 1,100 metres below the ground, the multi-legged creature surely lives up to its name inspired by the Greek god of the Underworld, Hades.
The species also comes as a nice complement to another cave-dweller of the same genus – Geophilus persephones, which carries the name of the mythological god’s wife, Persephone.
Did we overlook your own most beloved ZooKeys-published species? We’ll be happy for you to let us know about it in the Comments section below, Twitter (@ZooKeys_Journal) or Facebook (@ZooKeysJournal).
In their updated taxonomic list, the team of Dr. José De La Cruz-Agüero, Dr. Jorge Guillermo Chollet-Villalpando, and Venezuelan graduate students Lorem González-González and Nicolás R. Ehemann report eight chimaeras, 111 sharks and 98 ray and skate species. These numbers equate to 18% of the world’s chondrichthyans. 
