Category: Zoosystematics and Evolution

Vivid orange killifish discovered in the Brazilian Amazon

Researchers have described a new species of brilliantly coloured fish from a network of forest streams in the Brazilian Amazon, and have already recommended it for listing as Endangered because of the pressures facing its only known home.

Researchers have described a new species of brilliantly coloured fish from a network of forest streams in the Brazilian Amazon, and have already recommended it for listing as Endangered because of the pressures facing its only known home.

The fish, named Laimosemion laranja, is a killifish measuring less than three centimeters in standard length. Males are strikingly patterned, with rows of orange spots along the front half of the body and bold, chevron-shaped orange bars towards the tail, set against a pale grey flank.

  • Laimosemion laranja new species, INPA–ICT 062601, Paratype, female, 20.1 mm SL: Brazil, Amapá, Laranjal do Jari, Rio Cajari, Amazonas Basin. Photo: Yuri Abrantes.
  • Laimosemion laranja new species, INPA–ICT 062600, Holotype, male, 26.8 mm SL: Brazil, Amapá, Laranjal do Jari, Rio Cajari, Amazonas Basin. Photo: Yuri Abrantes.

It was found by Brazilian researchers from the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, the Instituto Peixe das Nuvens, the Universidade Federal do Pará and University of West Florida, during fieldwork in the Rio Cajari drainage in the southern state of Amapá.

“We are developing a research project aimed at investigating the evolution of life-history strategies in freshwater fishes of the family Rivulidae across different biomes in Brazil.

During our sampling in small rivers locally known as ‘igarapés’ in the Rio Cajari region, in Amapá State, we found this fish with a very striking coloration, which immediately caught our attention.”

Yuri Abrantes of the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte
  • The research team with Laimosemion laranja. Photo credit: Yuri Abrantes.
  • Waldir Miron Berbel-Filho with Laimosemion laranja. Photo credit: Yuri Abrantes.

Confirming that the fish was new to science required close comparison of its body proportions, scale counts and skeletal features against its closest relatives, together with an analysis of its mitochondrial DNA.

“It was an unexpected moment. Initially, what most caught our attention was the impressive coloration of the males and females, which was unlike anything we had previously encountered in the study area. This sparked our admiration and a great deal of curiosity.”

Yuri Abrantes
Laimosemion laranja sp. nov. Photo credit: Yuri Abrantes.

Once the genetic analysis confirmed the fish’s distinct identity, he said:

“It was something special, as we saw an opportunity to contribute to increasing our knowledge of Amazonian biodiversity and to draw attention to the conservation of areas that are still poorly explored but highly threatened.”

The species’ name, laranja, is Portuguese for both the colour orange and the fruit, a fitting nod to the males’ vivid markings. It also honours Laranjal do Jari, the Amapá municipality where the fish was found.

“We wanted to choose a name that would highlight a characteristic of the fish while also fostering a sense of connection with the people of the region where it was discovered.”

Yuri Abrantes
  • Habitat of Laimosemion laranja. Photo credit: Yuri Abrantes.

Laimosemion laranja belongs to a group of Amazonian killifish, some of which have evolved an unusual survival strategy: their embryos can pause development entirely, lying dormant in damp mud until seasonal pools refill with rain.

“Laimosemion represents one of the five independent origins of the annual life cycle within the family Rivulidae.

Laimosemion laranja is particularly interesting because it expands our knowledge of the diversity and evolution of this group in the region.”

Yuri Abrantes

The new species is currently known from just three small forest pools near Laranjal do Jari, all showing signs of disturbance from deforestation, mining and urban expansion; one site lies close to water discolored by mining sediment, while another, within the city itself, is affected by plastic pollution.

Laimosemion laranja in its habitat. Video credit: Yuri Abrantes.

With its entire known range covering an estimated 25 square kilometers, the researchers argue that Laimosemion laranja meets the criteria for an Endangered listing under IUCN guidelines, and have recommended extending the boundaries of the neighboring Rio Cajari Extractive Reserve to help protect it.

The study is published in the open-access journal Zoosystematics and Evolution.

Original source:

Abrantes YG, Lima SMQ, Nielsen DTB, de Lira FO, da Silva MJ, Berbel-Filho WM (2026) A new killifish of the genus Laimosemion (Cyprinodontiformes, Rivulidae) from Rio Cajari in the Brazilian Amazon. Zoosystematics and Evolution 102(4): 1079-1088. https://doi.org/10.3897/zse.102.187659

Check out the Zoosystematics and Evolution website and follow the journal on BlueSky and Facebook.

Pensoft launches ORPHO: A new intelligent workspace for scientific writing

The beta release of an innovative collaborative stand-alone authoring tool transforms manuscript preparation with semantic enrichment and real-time collaboration capabilities.

Scholarly publisher and technology provider Pensoft Publishers announces the beta launch of ORPHO, a revolutionary online platform designed to streamline collaborative scientific writing and produce AI-ready, future-proof scholarly literature. 

ORPHO presents a significant advancement in scholarly publishing technology, combining intuitive writing features with sophisticated semantic enrichment capabilities. The new platform builds upon Pensoft’s fifteen years of experience as a developer of semantic publishing infrastructure.

Key Features

Within a shared online workspace, researchers can start with built-in customisable templates, create their own or import an existing file. They can then team up with collaborators in real time using track changes, role-based user rights, inline comments, and document-level chat. More significantly, ORPHO automatically structures scientific content according to international publishing standards, making research outputs findable, discoverable, interoperable and reusable (FAIR) once published. 

Unlike its predecessor, the ARPHA Writing Tool, ORPHO is available as a standalone real-time collaborative workspace decoupled from journals hosted on Pensoft’s ARPHA Publishing Platform. Once a manuscript is ready, authors receive AI-FAIR machine-readable content that can be formatted to meet multiple journal requirements at the click of a button.

The platform’s adaptability to domain-specific workflows is currently being piloted in biodiversity science. ORPHO integrates seamlessly with leading biodiversity data aggregators, including the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), Barcode of Life Data Systems (BOLD) and PlutoF, via import and export facilities for structured data, making ORPHO particularly valuable for researchers handling taxonomic, ecological and biodiversity data. 

Taxon names, for example, can be automatically imported and linked through persistent identifiers from sources like the Catalogue of Life (CoL), International Plant Names Index (IPNI), World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) and World Flora Online (WFO).

  • ORPHO: A new intelligent workspace for scientific writing.

Why ORPHO?

The name draws inspiration from multiple sources which reflect the tool’s philosophy and heritage. Named after Orphium: a unique plant genus endemic to South Africa whose sole species (Orphium frutescens) is known as the sea rose, ORPHO reflects the platform’s distinctive nature, heritage, and core philosophy.

It also evokes Orpheus, the legendary musician of ancient Thrace whose home region, the Rhodopi Mountains, lies in present-day Bulgaria, where ORPHO’s developer, Pensoft, is headquartered. The name thus honours the tool’s origins whilst embodying the exceptional creative performance it enables. 

***

Prof. Dr. Lyubomir Penev, founder and CEO of Pensoft, comments:

“We are well aware that researchers today face an overwhelming list of formatting requirements and technical demands in an AI-driven landscape. It is true that rapid technological advancement presents both immense opportunities and mounting complexities for researchers.

We built ORPHO to remove that friction by offering an intuitive, collaborative workspace that lets scientists focus on their research. As a scientific publisher, our mission is to make scholarly publishing a seamless, rewarding experience fit for the modern age.”

The beta release invites researchers, institutions and publishing platforms to trial ORPHO and provide feedback. Access is available at orpho.net.

Pensoft at the 4th BioSyst.EU Meeting 2026

The 4th BioSyst.EU meeting took place in Uppsala, Sweden, from 17 to 19 August 2026, organised by the Swedish Systematics Association, in collaboration with Uppsala University.

Table of Contents

The 4th BioSyst.EU meeting took place in Uppsala, Sweden, from 17 to 19 August 2026, organised by the Swedish Systematics Association, in collaboration with Uppsala University. For three days, the conference brought together European systematists to celebrate the discipline in the very city where it was born, home to Carl Linnaeus and the foundations of modern taxonomy.

BioSyst.EU exists to give individual scientists across Europe a shared platform, working through their national and regional societies rather than institutions. It sits alongside the Consortium of European Taxonomic Facilities (CETAF), which represents natural history institutions, and together the two bodies aim to strengthen systematic biology, phylogenetics and biodiversity research across the continent.

This year’s programme combined talks, workshops and symposia with visits to historical sites connected to Linnaeus. The main event was preceded by an early career meeting on Sunday 16 August, which gave students and early career researchers a chance to connect before the conference proper began.

Meeting the community at our booth

Pensoft were delighted to attend with our own booth, where colleagues came to chat about our publishing services, from manuscript to final publication, as well as our tools for managing and publishing taxonomic and biodiversity data. 

Pensoft’s booth at BioSyst.EU, 2026.

It was a great opportunity to introduce our journal portfolio – more than half of which comprises taxonomy and systematics titles – to old friends and new faces alike, including titles such as: 

  • ZooKeys – one of the world’s leading journals for zoological taxonomy and biodiversity research, publishing new species descriptions and revisions across the animal kingdom
  • MycoKeys – dedicated to fungal systematics, taxonomy and biodiversity, supporting mycologists with rapid, richly illustrated publishing
  • PhytoKeys – focused on plant systematics and biodiversity, covering everything from single species descriptions to large-scale floristic studies
  • Metabarcoding and Metagenomics (MBMG) – a journal built around the fast-growing field of DNA-based biodiversity assessment, from environmental DNA to large-scale metagenomic surveys
  • Zoosystematics and Evolution – published with the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, covering zoological systematics, morphology and evolutionary biology
  • Evolutionary Systematics – dedicated to whole-organism biology of extant and fossil animals 

…and many more!

Pensoft’s journal portfolio comprising taxonomy and systematics titles.

It was also a pleasure to meet some of our authors, reviewers and subject editors at the booth!

  • Alice Petzold – subject editor in Natural History Collections and Museomics.
  • Oleksandr Holovachov – author in Biodiversity Data Journal, and Metabarcoding and Metagenomics.
  • Oleksandr Ordynets – author and reviewer for Biodiversity Data Journal, MycoKeys, and Plant Ecology and Evolution.
  • Viktor Hartung – subject editor for Deutsche Entomologische Zeitschrift.

Conference presentation highlights

One of the undoubted highlights of the conference was the keynote talk by Sandra Knapp, editor-in-chief of PhytoKeys, titled Taming the beasts: strategies for studying megadiversity. Knapp tackled the question: what do we do with genera that contain more than a thousand species?

She subsequently made the case that studying genera properly, from geography to identification, pays dividends for both collaborative science and our understanding of evolution.

  • Sandra Knapp at Pensoft’s booth.
  • Sandra Knapp’s presentation at BioSyst.EU 2026.

Another highlight was the keynote lecture by Paul Hebert, Chair of the MBMG Advisory Board: The End Game – All Species & Their Interactions. Hebert reflected on the tens of millions of multicellular species we share the planet with, most still undescribed and many at risk of disappearing before they are even documented.

Paul Hebert’s presentation at BioSyst.EU 2026.

Among the other talks we attended was by one of our long-time partners, Olaf Banki, on the Catalogue of Life: taxonomic data services and infrastructure for all. Olaf reflected on the initiative’s evolution, from its origins thirty years ago to today, where the Catalogue of Life now serves as the taxonomic reference underpinning close to 4 billion species occurrences mediated through GBIF.

He gave a valuable overview of where the initiative stands: what it offers different user groups, including taxonomists and data infrastructures, where taxonomic data gaps remain, and how the community can contribute going forward. 

Olaf Banki’s presentation at BioSyst.EU 2026.

Notably, Pensoft’s journals are integrated with Catalogue of Life to help list the species of the world. You can find out more about this initiative by accessing the following blog post.

A final highlight was Alexander Edwards’ presentation, titled Where Were You Yesterday? Interrogating Floral Constancy in Bumble Bee Workers Using Pollen Metabarcoding. Edwards presented work using ITS2 pollen metabarcoding to study the foraging behaviour of individually marked Bombus terrestris workers in a semi-natural university garden, sampling pollen non-lethally from returning foragers over several days.

It was particularly nice to catch up with Alexander, having worked with him previously on a guest blog post, The bee’s knees: a new, non-lethal way to study pollinator networks, which explored the same non-lethal sampling approach.

  • Alexander Edwards at Pensoft’s booth.
  • Alexander Edwards’ presentation at BioSyst.EU 2026.

Award winners

And a massive congratulations to all our award winners! In the Best Student Poster category, first prize went to Giada Spagliardi of the University of Toronto for her poster Finding depth at the surface: museomics and species boundaries of bubble-rafting gastropods, while the runner-up prize was awarded to Hannah Cremer of the Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum, Frankfurt, for Long Hidden in Tubes: First Steps Towards Resolving the Filograna/Salmacina Complex (Serpulidae).

In the Best Student Talk category, first prize was awarded to Alexander Edwards of the University of Kassel for his talk Where Were You Yesterday? Interrogating Floral Constancy in Bumble Bee Workers Using Pollen Metabarcoding, with the runner-up prize going to Tina Kiedaisch of the University of Munich (LMU) for Intercontinental dispersal, ecological shifts and repeated origins of C4 photosynthesis shaped the evolution of Amaranthaceae s.s..

The awardees at BioSys.EU 2026.

An excursion to Linnaeus’ Hammarby

On 20 August, participants also had the option to join an excursion to Hammarby, Linnaeus’ summer house just outside Uppsala. It is a rare chance to step inside an authentic 18th century Swedish manor that reveals both the private life of Linnaeus and the scientific work he carried out there! 

Pensoft notably visited the University of Uppsala Botanical Garden, also known as the Linnaean Garden, where Olof Rudbeck the Elder and Carl von Linnaeus worked:

  • The Linnaean Garden, 2026.

Until next time

The 4th BioSyst.EU meeting was a fitting tribute to the roots of systematics, held in the city where the discipline effectively began. From megadiverse genera to pollen metabarcoding and the future of biodiversity monitoring, the talks reflected how dynamic the field remains. We were delighted to be part of it, and to spend three days connecting with the scientific community. We look forward to the next BioSyst.EU meeting!

Catching up with Michael Schmitt at Pensoft’s booth – our subject editor for Zookeys and Arthropods systematics and phylogeny.

Follow us on Bluesky, Facebook, X, and LinkedIn for future conference updates.

The Pensoft Biodiversity Cup 2026 comes to a close

Now that the 2026 FIFA World Cup is over, it’s time for us to blow the final whistle on Pensoft’s Biodiversity Cup.

The floodlights have dimmed, the confetti has settled, and the 2026 FIFA World Cup has officially come to an end. A huge congratulations to Spain, who saw off Argentina 1-0 after extra time to lift their second World Cup trophy.

And with the football finished, it’s time for us to blow the final whistle on our own tournament too. Throughout the World Cup, we ran the Pensoft Biodiversity Cup alongside the real competition – a weekly knockout contest on our Instagram page, pitting some of the most remarkable species described in our journals against one another.

Every Thursday we opened the polls, and every Monday we brought you the result. Now that the dust has settled, we thought it was the perfect moment to look back at how the tournament unfolded.

Here’s how each fixture played out, with the winning species (as voted for by you!) shown in blue bold:

DateSpecies #1Species #2
11/06Nadzikambia goodallaeFerreiraella populi
18/06Hellwigia opalinaNeohelicomyces coffeae
25/06Thecacera sesamaDolichopoda balrogi
02/07Pikelinia floydmurariaTrachischium lalremsangai
09/07Theridion himalayanaPyralis papaleonei
19/07Iberoscia zaragozaiEchinodorus nenufar
General recap of Pensoft’s Biodiversity Cup.

Our first week’s competition kicked off with a cloud-forest chameleon named after Jane Goodall, which faced off against a public-named deep-sea chiton from the abyssal Pacific:

Nadzikambia goodallae vs Ferreiraella populi.

The chameleon, Nadzikambia goodallae, came out on top in this opening clash, advancing past the deep-sea chiton Ferreiraella populi.

Round two, meanwhile, pitted a turquoise-flowered jade ginger from Sulawesi against a newly identified fungus found on dead coffee branches in Yunnan:

Hellwigia opalina vs Neohelicomyces coffeae.

…and round two went to the fungi! Neohelicomyces coffeae ended up decisively defeating the jade ginger Hellwigia opalina in this Plant vs Fungi edition.

Round three brought Cave vs. Coast: a Balrog-named cave cricket unearthed on Kastellorizo faced a sesame-speckled nudibranch discovered off northeastern Taiwan:

Thecacera sesama vs Dolichopoda balrogi.

Our third round went to the underdog (or in this case, undercricket): Dolichopoda balrogi, which hopped past Thecacera sesama in a unanimous win.

Round four was our Animal Kingdom edition, with the newly described Pink Floyd spider Pikelinia floydmuraria facing off against the burrowing snake Trachischium lalremsangai for the top spot:

Pikelinia floydmuraria vs Trachischium lalremsangai.

The snake slithered through – Trachischium lalremsangai defeated Pikelinia floydmuraria, its burrowing lifestyle proving harder to top than a rock-star spider name in this round.

Our second-to-last round paired the smiley-faced Himalayan Happy-Face Spider, Theridion himalayana, against Pyralis papaleonei, a papal-named moth endemic to Crete’s White Mountains:

Theridion himalayana vs Pyralis papaleonei.

The moth flew past the competition! Pyralis papaleonei took the win over Theridion himalayana, its rare papal namesake and striking wing bands proving enough to edge out even a face full of smiles.

Our own final on 19 July ended up mirroring the World Cup final to a tee, with a species from Spain going head-to-head with one from Argentina:

Iberoscia zaragozai vs Echinodorus nenufar.

Representing Spain in the final was Iberoscia zaragozai, a newly described genus and species of cave-dwelling isopod, published only this April in our open-access journal Subterranean Biology.

Discovered in caves across Catalonia, Murcia and the Valencian Community, this blind crustacean measures barely 3-4 mm long, yet required a new genus to accommodate it, thanks to its unique features – right down to its antennal sensory structures.

Fittingly, it’s named in posthumous tribute to the Spanish arachnologist Juan Antonio Zaragoza-Miralles, in recognition of his decades of work on the cave-dwelling fauna of the Iberian Peninsula.

Standing in Argentina’s corner was Echinodorus nenufar, a new aquatic plant described in PhytoKeys back in January. Found in the temporary ponds and seasonal wetlands of the dry Chaco region of northern Argentina and western Paraguay, it earns its name – “nenúfar” being Spanish for water lily – thanks to its rounded floating leaves and creamy-white flowers, which give it an uncanny resemblance to a true Nymphaeaceae water lily.

Like the seasonal killifish it shares its ephemeral ponds with, it has evolved to complete its whole life cycle in habitats that can appear and vanish with the rains.

Two species, two countries, both barely a few months old to science. This is a proper final if ever there was one. And… just like their footballing counterparts, it was the Spanish contender that came out on top!

We had an absolute blast running the Biodiversity Cup alongside this year’s World Cup, and we hope it gave you a fun new way to discover some of the incredible species being described in our journals. Thank you to everyone who voted, shared and cheered along from the side lines.

Keep up with our latest news and campaigns by following us on Facebook, Bluesky, X, Instagram, LinkedIn and TikTok.

Pensoft awarded the FAO AGRIS Seal of Recognition for 2027

The seal recognises institutions that consistently share open-access agricultural research with the global community.

Pensoft has been awarded the Seal of Recognition for the FAO AGRIS Active Data Provider of the Year for 2027. The seal is granted by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations through its AGRIS initiative, and it recognises institutions that consistently share open-access agricultural research with the global community.

Notably, Pensoft joined the FAO AGRIS network back in 2024, and the organisation has renewed our seal every year since, a recognition we’re proud to have kept.

What has changed is the scale of our contribution. In 2024, Pensoft’s records on AGRIS numbered just under 15,000. Today, that figure has doubled to nearly 30,000, drawn from all 51 of our journals that fall within the scope of FAO AGRIS. The subjects covered are wide-ranging, spanning taxonomy, biodiversity, conservation and biogeography – these are all areas that feed directly into sustainable agriculture and natural resource management.

Through AGRIS, this research travels well beyond our own journals to researchers, policymakers and practitioners worldwide, adding to the shared pool of open knowledge that supports global food security and environmental sustainability. We’re glad to keep contributing to that effort, and look forward to continuing our work with FAO AGRIS in the years to come.

About FAO

The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) is a specialised agency of the United Nations that leads international efforts to defeat hunger. Its goal is to achieve food security for all, ensuring that people have regular access to enough high-quality food to lead active, healthy lives. With 194 members, 193 countries and the European Union, FAO works in over 130 countries worldwide.

About Pensoft

Founded in 1992 “by scientists, for scientists,” Pensoft is an academic open-access publishing company well known worldwide for its cutting-edge publishing tools, workflows and methods for text and data publishing of journals, books and conference materials. In 2010, Pensoft became the first scientific publisher to introduce semantic enrichments in scholarly publications. Through its Research and Technical Development department, the company is involved in a range of research and technology projects.

New Species of Giant Salamander Discovered in Anhui, China

With the discovery of a new giant salamander of the genus Andrias, the total number of globally recognised species has risen to 6.

Giant salamanders of the genus Andrias are the largest living amphibians on Earth and, it turns out, more diverse than previously known. For many years, Chinese giant salamanders were classified as a single widespread species. But through recent molecular and morphological research, they have been shown to harbor far greater species richness than previously recognised.

Now, a collaborative team of researchers has formally described a new species: Andrias yaoluopingensis, discovered in the Yaoluoping National Nature Reserve in Yuexi County, Anhui Province, China. The full description is available in the open-access journal Zoosystematics and Evolution.

New Giant Salamander from the Mountain Streams

Andrias yaoluopingensis
Holotype of Andrias yaoluopingensis (HSA25201). A. Dorsalateral view in life; B. Environment of the sampling location. Photos credit to Zhihao Jiang and Kai Zhao.

The salamander was first found sheltering among stone crevices in the Macao River at an elevation of 948 meters. Researchers employed an integrative taxonomic approach, combining mitochondrial DNA analysis with detailed morphological examination, to confirm its status as a distinct species.

  • Andrias yaoluopingensis
    Holotype of Andrias yaoluopingensis (HSA25201) in life. A. Dorsal view; B. Lateral view (right side); C. Ventral view Photo credit to Zhihao Jiang and Song Huang.
  • Holotype of Andrias yaoluopingensis (HSA25201). A. Dorsal view of head; B. Ventral view of head; C. Ventral view of left fingers; D. Ventral view of left toes Photo credit to Zhihao Jiang and Song Huang.

Andrias yaoluopingensis, or the Yaoluoping Giant Salamander, is distinguished from other known giant salamanders by several physical characteristics: a notably flat head and trunk; slight webbing between the digits; a tan dorsal surface marked with darker blotches in life; and irregularly distributed tubercles above the eyes.

The discovery brings the total number of recognised Andrias species worldwide to six.

Conservation Implications

The discovery highlights the pressing need for deeper field surveys to uncover overlooked biodiversity in unexplored regions. Wild populations of Chinese giant salamanders have suffered severe declines across the country, primarily driven by overexploitation, as well as habitat loss and environmental degradation. The researchers stress that:

[…] for these critically endangered organisms, more field surveys and further classification at the species level are necessary and urgent.

The morphological and molecular data provided by this discovery will serve as a crucial reference for the targeted conservation of different giant salamander lineages, proper genetic management, and the successful release of artificially bred populations.

Original source:

Jiang Z, Huang R, Yang J, Zhao K, Zhang Y, Zhang T, Zhang Y, Chu J, Chen J, Huang S (2026) A new species of the Giant Salamander genus Andrias (Amphibia, Urodela, Cryptobranchidae) from Yuexi, Anhui, China. Zoosystematics and Evolution 102(2): 649-658. https://doi.org/10.3897/zse.102.179377

A Philosopher’s Serpent: New Grass-Green Pitviper Discovered in China’s Giant Panda National Park

The species name honours the philosopher known as Laozi, whose teachings emphasise the balance between humanity and the natural world.

The misty forests of the Giant Panda National Park in western Sichuan have long been a focus for biodiversity conservation. While the park is synonymous with its namesake bear, recent research has highlighted a different kind of resident. A team of scientists from the Chengdu Institute of Biology and other regional institutions recently identified a new species of pitviper that had been overlooked for decades. The results are published in the open-access journal Zoosystematics and Evolution.

Trimeresurus lii in life. (Image credit: Bo Cai).

Named Trimeresurus lii, or the Huaxi Green Pitviper, the snake was previously confused with the more common bamboo pitviper. Through a combination of genetic sequencing and detailed physical analysis, researchers determined that these populations represent a distinct lineage. The species name honours Li Er, the philosopher known as Laozi, whose teachings emphasise the balance between humanity and the natural world.

Fresh specimen of the holotype of Trimeresurus lii. (Image credit: Bo Cai).

Visually, the Huaxi Green Pitviper is defined by its vibrant grass-green body and distinct eye colors that range from amber to orange-yellow. There are clear physical differences between the sexes. Males feature a tricolor stripe of red and white along their sides, while females possess a simpler yellow stripe. One of the technical features that helped researchers distinguish this snake from its relatives is its smooth head scales, a trait not found in similar species within the region.

Habitat of Trimeresurus lii. (Image credit: Bo Cai).

The discovery took place in the West China Rain Zone, specifically around Mt. Emei and Xiling Snow Mountain. This area is a known biodiversity hotspot, yet many of its smaller or less charismatic species remain understudied. The identification of Trimeresurus lii as the 58th species in its genus serves as a reminder that even well-documented regions still hold biological secrets.

Map showing the type localities of Trimeresurus species and the localities of Trimeresurus lii. (Image credit: Cai et al.).

This find underscores the broader value of the Giant Panda National Park. By protecting large swaths of habitat for flagship species, the park inadvertently preserves a complex ecosystem of specialised reptiles and amphibians. Documenting these animals is a necessary step toward understanding the full scope of life within China’s protected wilderness.

Original source:

Cai B, Gou Y, Wang G, Liu F, Liang D, Gu X, Gu H, Fang H, Liu Y, Li Q, Ding L (2026) A new species of the genus Trimeresurus Lacépède, 1804 (Squamata, Viperidae) from western Sichuan Province, China. Zoosystematics and Evolution 102(1): 285-302. https://doi.org/10.3897/zse.102.178601

Check out the Zoosystematics and Evolution website and follow the journal on BlueSky and Facebook.

Meet the Crevice Weaver: A Newly Discovered Urban Spider from Colombia

The Pikelinia floydmuraria, a new addition to the South American Pikelinia population, was observed in Colombia’s department of Tolima and is now described in the journal Zoosystematics and Evolution.

A team of researchers from institutions across South America have expanded scholarly knowledge of the Pikelinia spider genus, with their recent discovery of a new crevice weaver species: Pikelinia floydmuraria.

The new species name is a creative tribute to the legendary rock band Pink Floyd, while simultaneously referencing the spider’s specific habitat. “Muraria,” derived from the Latin word for “wall”, reflects the species’ tendency to reside in the walls of buildings, though indeed also alludes to the iconic Pink Floyd album, The Wall.

  • A photo of the wall were these spiders live in Armenia, Quindío. Photo credit to Leonardo Delgado-Santa.
  • Pikelinia floydmuraria, male paratype. Credit to Leonardo Delgado-Santa.

These findings are described in greater detail in the open-access journal Zoosystematics and Evolution (ZSE) and serve as a particularly important contribution to the wider study of synanthropic spiders – species that have adapted to human-created environments. Despite the ecological importance of these spiders in Colombia, research into their biology and nutritional ecology has received little attention. The discovery of the Pikelinia floydmuraria, alongside observations of additional populations in neighbouring Colombian departments, holds the potential to remedy this problem.

The species establishment

The first regional review of the genus Pikelinia was established in 1946 by the Brazilian zoologist Mello-Leitão. For decades, the genus remained obscure, with species often misidentified or “lumped” into the type genus Filistata, most commonly found in the Mediterranean region.

In 2022, however, a major study redefined Pikelinia as part of a distinct South American spider group. Pikelinia floydmuraria is the most recent addition to the genus and provides considerable insight into the dietary composition of these crevice weavers.

Skilled hunters

  • Pikelinia floydmuraria from Tolima, Female Juvenile, attacking a cockroach on the web. Credit: Julio C. González-Gómez.
  • Pikelinia floydmuraria from Tolima, Female Juvenile, attacking a cockroach on the web. Credit: Julio C. González-Gómez.

These spiders are skilled hunters, primarily feeding on insects including flies, beetles and ants. Remarkably, they are capable of taking down prey up to six times their own size and often build their webs near streetlights to catch insects attracted to the glow. The above figure provides a visual representation of the spider’s predatory behaviour in urban habitats, demonstrating its ability to prey on insects larger than itself.By keeping these insect populations under control, crevice weavers thus maintain a healthier balance in the Colombian urban environment.

The research team behind this discovery, led by Osvaldo Villarreal and Leonardo Delgado-Santa, note that Pikelinia floydmuraria only measure about 3 to 4 millimetres in length. One of their most unique internal features is found in the females, which contain reproductive organs comprising long and slender tubes that are shaped like the letter “S”. In urban environments, they can be found tucked in the cracks and crevices of building walls, with observed concentrations reaching between 20 and 30 spiders in a single square metre.

Pikelinia fasciata, female from Galapagos A. Habitus (dorsal view).  Credit: Andrea C. Roman.

The researchers further observed that Pikelinia floydmuraria is a very close relative of another species called Pikelinia fasciata, which lives in the Galapagos Islands. Despite being separated by the Pacific Ocean and Andes mountain range, the two look almost exactly alike, leaving scientists to wonder: how did such similar spiders end up so far apart? It remains a mystery as to whether these traits reflect shared ancestry or similar ecological adaptations.

Nonetheless, the two can be differentiated by the appearance of their legs, with the Colombian spider displaying solid-colours, and the Galapagos featuring darker rings by contrast. The Galapagos female spiders additionally have shorter and straighter reproductive organs in comparison to the Colombian female.

Further research needed

@pensoft.publishers

🎸🕸️ Meet the latest rock star of the #spider world: Pikelinia floydmuraria. 🕷️Recently discovered in Colombia, this species was officially named after @Pink Floyd as a tribute to both their iconic album “The Wall” and the spider’s favourite hangout: urban city walls. ➡️ Follow the link to read more about this discovery: https://zse.pensoft.net/article/175423/ ➡️Or see the blog post here: https://blog.pensoft.net/2026/04/14/meet-the-crevice-weaver-a-newly-discovered-urban-spider-from-colombia/ #arachnid #spiders #newspecies #science

♬ original sound – Pensoft Publishers

In order to better determine whether Pikelinia floydmuraria is a unique species native to Colombia, the South American researchers suggest the implementation of DNA barcoding in future studies. This will provide genetic evidence that could help map the evolutionary history of Pikelinia floydmuraria. A DNA-based dietary analysis, meanwhile, would quantify the extent to which these spiders operate as natural urban pest regulators.

Whether they are just “another web in the wall” or a relative from the Galapagos, the discovery of Pikelinia floydmuraria represents a significant advancement in our understanding of South American spider taxonomy. By identifying this new Colombian species and providing the first-ever detailed anatomical description for its relative, Pikelinia fasciata, researchers have expanded scientific knowledge of the Pikelinia genus.

Pikelinia floydmuraria may be small and “comfortably numb” to the bustle of the city, but their impact on maintaining a healthy urban ecosystem is anything but quiet.

Original source

Villarreal O, Delgado-Santa L, González-Gómez JC, Rodríguez-Castro GA, Román AC, Agudelo E, García LF (2026) Another web in the wall: A new Pikelinia Mello-Leitão, 1946 (Araneae, Filistatidae) from Colombia, with notes on its diet and description of the female genitalia of P. fasciata (Banks, 1902). Zoosystematics and Evolution 102(1): 357-366. https://doi.org/10.3897/zse.102.175423

ResearchGate and Pensoft Publishers announce expansion of their Journal Home partnership

The partnership now expands to 40 journals, covering the majority of Pensoft’s and partner’s journals.

Berlin (Germany) and Sofia (Bulgaria), 10th February, 2026 – ResearchGate, the professional network for researchers, and Pensoft Publishers, an independent open access publisher and provider of high-quality scholarly publishing services, today announced an expansion of their Journal Home partnership. Building on an earlier collaboration announced in 2023, the list now expands to 40 journals, covering the majority of Pensoft’s and partners’ journals using the publisher’s ARPHA Publishing Platform. 

Amongst the journals now enjoying increased visibility across the ResearchGate’s community of 25+ million researcher members are well-renowned scholarly titles affiliated with the Natural History Museum in Berlin, Swiss Academy of Sciences, International Association for Vegetation Science and The International Biogeography Society, as well as recently launched Pensoft journals, such as Individual-based Ecology, Natural History Collections and Museomics, and Food and Ecological Systems Modelling Journal.

With most of Pensoft’s eligible partner journals choosing to participate, the expansion reflects strong demand for greater exposure and engagement opportunities, particularly among smaller and developing journals in niche research areas. Through Journal Home, partner publishers can reach more relevant audiences, improve discoverability, and connect more effectively with researchers worldwide.

Participating Pensoft journals will also benefit from:

  • Increased usage and readership, with full-text open access journal content seamlessly surfaced to highly relevant researcher communities across the ResearchGate platform.
  • Stronger engagement from new and returning authors, connecting partner journals, including specialist and emerging titles, with targeted researchers and potential authors throughout the research lifecycle.
  • Dedicated Journal Profiles and prominent placement of Pensoft journals to enhance visibility and branding, boosting recognition of partner journals with researcher communities around the world.
  • Improved author experience, with the automatic addition of published articles to author profiles, clearer insight into reader engagement, and greater opportunities for meaningful collaboration.

“Journal Home allows us to provide our partner journals with improved visibility and stronger connections with global researcher communities. Many of these journals serve highly specialised fields, and Journal Home helps make sure their articles reach the right researchers, who will benefit from them most.”

Lyubomir Penev, CEO and founder of Pensoft Publishers

“We’re pleased to expand our Journal Home partnership with Pensoft to support an increasing number of partner journals. By bringing these journals onto the platform, smaller and emerging titles can expand their reach, attract high-quality submissions, and connect with the most relevant researcher communities at key moments in their research journey.”

Robyn Mugridge, Head of Partnership Development at ResearchGate

For more information about Journal Home, please visit www.researchgate.net/journal-home.

For more information about ResearchGate, please visit www.researchgate.net.

For more information about Pensoft Publishers, please visit www.pensoft.net.

About ResearchGate

ResearchGate is the professional network for researchers. Over 25 million researchers use researchgate.net to share and discover research, build their networks, and advance their careers. Based in Berlin, ResearchGate was founded in 2008. Its mission is to connect the world of science and make research open to all.

About Pensoft Publishers

Pensoft is an independent, open-access scholarly publisher and technology provider, best known for its 40+ biodiversity journals, including ZooKeys, Biodiversity Data Journal, PhytoKeys, MycoKeys, One Ecosystem, and Metabarcoding and Metagenomics. Ever since becoming the first to introduce semantic enrichments and hyperlinks within a scientific article in the field of biodiversity in 2010, Pensoft has been working on various tools and workflows designed to facilitate data findability, accessibility, discoverability and interoperability.

Pensoft and the University of Zurich sign strategic OA Agreement to support Swiss research

The agreement encompasses five key research and medical bodies, and allows corresponding authors to publish their findings without individual Article Processing Charges.

Pensoft and the University of Zurich have signed a comprehensive Open Access (OA) agreement, starting a partnership that enables researchers at participating institutions to publish their findings in Pensoft’s peer-reviewed journals without incurring individual Article Processing Charges (APCs).

The agreement encompasses five key research and medical bodies, namely the University of Zurich, the University Hospital of Zurich, Balgrist University Hospital, University Children’s Hospital Zurich, and the Psychiatrische Universitätsklinik.

Researchers from these institutions can now publish without worrying about APCs in 65 peer-reviewed journals published by Pensoft or hosted on its advanced ARPHA platform, including flagship titles such as ZooKeys, PhytoKeys, Biodiversity Data Journal, NeoBiota, and IMA Fungus.

Under this new framework, publishing costs for corresponding authors affiliated with the respective institutions are 100% covered by a centralised institutional deposit secured by the University of Zurich. By removing financial barriers, the agreement encourages scientists to disseminate their work to both the academic community and the wider public, making research immediately and freely available upon publication.

This initiative ensures that research is shared under open licences in strict accordance with the FAIR principles—making data Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable.

“We are excited to start this partnership with the University of Zurich and sign an agreement that reflects our strong commitment to  inclusive and equitable open science. By supporting researcher-driven publishing, we continue to foster a sustainable environment for high-impact scientific communication.”

Prof. Lyubomir Penev, CEO of Pensoft

“We are pleased to extend our portfolio of gold open access journals, in which our researchers can publish their findings without paying individual APCs. We thereby strengthen our commitment to open research information.”

University Library Zurich

Are you affiliated with a research institution operating with OA agreements? Is your institution interested in helping resident researchers navigate the complex processes underpinning academic publishing and knowledge sharing? Reach out to <publishing@pensoft.net> to discuss a potential collaboration.