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Off the scale: a new species of fish-scale gecko (Squamata: Gekkonidae: Geckolepis) with exceptionally large scales

The gecko genus Geckolepis, endemic to Madagascar and the Comoro archipelago, is taxonomically challenging. One reason is its members ability to autotomize a large portion of their scales when grasped or touched, most likely to escape predation. Based on an integrative taxonomic approach including e...

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Autores principales: Scherz, Mark D., Daza, Juan D., Köhler, Jörn, Vences, Miguel, Glaw, Frank
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: PeerJ Inc. 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5299998/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28194313
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.2955
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author Scherz, Mark D.
Daza, Juan D.
Köhler, Jörn
Vences, Miguel
Glaw, Frank
author_facet Scherz, Mark D.
Daza, Juan D.
Köhler, Jörn
Vences, Miguel
Glaw, Frank
author_sort Scherz, Mark D.
collection PubMed
description The gecko genus Geckolepis, endemic to Madagascar and the Comoro archipelago, is taxonomically challenging. One reason is its members ability to autotomize a large portion of their scales when grasped or touched, most likely to escape predation. Based on an integrative taxonomic approach including external morphology, morphometrics, genetics, pholidosis, and osteology, we here describe the first new species from this genus in 75 years: Geckolepis megalepis sp. nov. from the limestone karst of Ankarana in northern Madagascar. The new species has the largest known body scales of any gecko (both relatively and absolutely), which come off with exceptional ease. We provide a detailed description of the skeleton of the genus Geckolepis based on micro-Computed Tomography (micro-CT) analysis of the new species, the holotype of G. maculata, the recently resurrected G. humbloti, and a specimen belonging to an operational taxonomic unit (OTU) recently suggested to represent G. maculata. Geckolepis is characterized by highly mineralized, imbricated scales, paired frontals, and unfused subolfactory processes of the frontals, among other features. We identify diagnostic characters in the osteology of these geckos that help define our new species and show that the OTU assigned to G. maculata is probably not conspecific with it, leaving the taxonomic identity of this species unclear. We discuss possible reasons for the extremely enlarged scales of G. megalepis in the context of an anti-predator defence mechanism, and the future of Geckolepis taxonomy.
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spelling pubmed-52999982017-02-13 Off the scale: a new species of fish-scale gecko (Squamata: Gekkonidae: Geckolepis) with exceptionally large scales Scherz, Mark D. Daza, Juan D. Köhler, Jörn Vences, Miguel Glaw, Frank PeerJ Taxonomy The gecko genus Geckolepis, endemic to Madagascar and the Comoro archipelago, is taxonomically challenging. One reason is its members ability to autotomize a large portion of their scales when grasped or touched, most likely to escape predation. Based on an integrative taxonomic approach including external morphology, morphometrics, genetics, pholidosis, and osteology, we here describe the first new species from this genus in 75 years: Geckolepis megalepis sp. nov. from the limestone karst of Ankarana in northern Madagascar. The new species has the largest known body scales of any gecko (both relatively and absolutely), which come off with exceptional ease. We provide a detailed description of the skeleton of the genus Geckolepis based on micro-Computed Tomography (micro-CT) analysis of the new species, the holotype of G. maculata, the recently resurrected G. humbloti, and a specimen belonging to an operational taxonomic unit (OTU) recently suggested to represent G. maculata. Geckolepis is characterized by highly mineralized, imbricated scales, paired frontals, and unfused subolfactory processes of the frontals, among other features. We identify diagnostic characters in the osteology of these geckos that help define our new species and show that the OTU assigned to G. maculata is probably not conspecific with it, leaving the taxonomic identity of this species unclear. We discuss possible reasons for the extremely enlarged scales of G. megalepis in the context of an anti-predator defence mechanism, and the future of Geckolepis taxonomy. PeerJ Inc. 2017-02-07 /pmc/articles/PMC5299998/ /pubmed/28194313 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.2955 Text en ©2017 Scherz et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
spellingShingle Taxonomy
Scherz, Mark D.
Daza, Juan D.
Köhler, Jörn
Vences, Miguel
Glaw, Frank
Off the scale: a new species of fish-scale gecko (Squamata: Gekkonidae: Geckolepis) with exceptionally large scales
title Off the scale: a new species of fish-scale gecko (Squamata: Gekkonidae: Geckolepis) with exceptionally large scales
title_full Off the scale: a new species of fish-scale gecko (Squamata: Gekkonidae: Geckolepis) with exceptionally large scales
title_fullStr Off the scale: a new species of fish-scale gecko (Squamata: Gekkonidae: Geckolepis) with exceptionally large scales
title_full_unstemmed Off the scale: a new species of fish-scale gecko (Squamata: Gekkonidae: Geckolepis) with exceptionally large scales
title_short Off the scale: a new species of fish-scale gecko (Squamata: Gekkonidae: Geckolepis) with exceptionally large scales
title_sort off the scale: a new species of fish-scale gecko (squamata: gekkonidae: geckolepis) with exceptionally large scales
topic Taxonomy
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5299998/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28194313
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.2955
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