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Introduction
Current institution
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February 2005 - present
Position
- Faculty Member
Description
- Biju has been studying amphibians in India since the past 25 years. Disciplines covered by his research include systematics, molecular phylogeny, reproductive ecology and biodiversity conservation
February 2005 - present
Position
- Faculty Member
Description
- Biju has been studying amphibians in India since the past 25 years. Disciplines covered by his research include systematics, molecular phylogeny/evolution, reproductive ecology and biodiversity conservation
Publications
Publications (183)
Based on a recent molecular phylogenetic study, the South Asian microhylid genus Uperodon (subfamily Microhylinae) currently comprises of 12 valid species that are largely restricted to India and Sri Lanka. Considering the revised generic-level status of its various members, here we review the taxonomy of all known species in this genus and clarify...
About 96% of the more than 4,800 living anuran species belong to the Neobatrachia or advanced frogs. Because of the extremely poor representation of these animals in the Mesozoic fossil record, hypotheses on their early evolution have to rely largely on extant taxa. Here we report the discovery of a burrowing frog from India that is noticeably dist...
In this study, we investigate species level diversity in the monotypic frog family Micrixalidae, which is endemic to the Western Ghats of Peninsular India. Attempting the first nearcomplete taxon sampling of Indian dancing frogs from the entire Western Ghats, we use 138 tissue samples collected from 70 localities over the last 12 years for DNA barc...
A systematic revision of the genus Hylarana in the Western Ghats-Sri Lanka biodiversity hotspot is presented. Species de-lineation in Hylarana is complicated due to a lack of distinct colour differences or striking morphological characters, leading to potential misidentification. We conducted extensive surveys throughout the Western Ghats-Sri Lanka...
The Rufescent Burrowing Frog, Fejervarya rufescens, is thought to have a wide distribution across the Western Ghats in Peninsular India. This locally abundant but secretive species has a short breeding period, making it a challenging subject for field studies. We sampled 16 populations of frogs morphologically similar to F. rufescens in order to un...
We studied the larval morphology and natural history of two species of Minervarya from the Andaman Islands of India. A recent assignment of Charles Darwin’s frog to the genus Minervarya opened up new questions on the systematic affinities and natural history of its enigmatic tadpoles. Originally described as Rana charlesdarwini Das, 1998, and long...
Systematic assessments of species extinction risk at regular intervals are necessary for informing conservation action1,2. Ongoing developments in taxonomy, threatening processes and research further underscore the need for reassessment3,4. Here we report the findings of the second Global Amphibian Assessment, evaluating 8,011 species for the Inter...
Since the description of Charles Darwin’s frog as Rana charlesdarwini in 1998, its generic placement has been a taxonomic enigma. Subsequent studies first transferred this species to the dicroglossid genus Limnonectes , and then considered it as a ceratobatrachid of the genus Ingerana , which has since been moved to the family Dicroglossidae. Howev...
Recent studies on frogs of the Microhyla heymonsi species complex have demonstrated that high genetic variation exists among its various known populations from regions across Asia. We assessed the taxonomic identity of the Nicobar population of Microhyla cf. heymonsi and compared it to the typical Microhyla heymonsi from Taiwan and the two recently...
The genus Minervarya is among the most widely distributed, commonly occurring, and taxonomically confusing groups of dicroglossid frogs in India. Recent studies have provided evidence that this genus contains complexes of morphologically conserved but genetically divergent taxa—some widely distributed across South and Southeast Asia, and many parti...
We describe the hand and foot musculature of the fossorial Indian purple frog, Nasikabatrachus sahyadrensis, and compare it to other members of Sooglossoidea: the Seychellean sooglossid genera Sechellophryne and Sooglossus. Due to the key phylogenetic position of Sooglossoidea, we compare its members with the diversity of Anura and define 52 charac...
The genus Minervarya is among the most widely
distributed, commonly occurring, and taxonomically
confusing groups of dicroglossid frogs in India. Recent
studies have provided evidence that this genus contains
complexes of morphologically conserved but genetically
divergent taxa—some widely distributed across South and
Southeast Asia, and many parti...
We rediscovered two species of toads, Bufo stomaticus peninsularis and Bufo brevirostris , which were described from Peninsular India 84 and 101 years ago, respectively, but have not been reported since. Because the name-bearing types of both species are either damaged or lost, we provide detailed redescriptions, morphological comparisons, and insi...
A tiny new species of narrow-mouthed frog of the genus Microhyla is described from the island of Belitung and southeastern Sumatra, Indonesia. The most distinctive feature of the new frog is its diminutive adult size, snout-vent length ranging only from 12.3 to 15.8 mm in adult males. Phylogenetic analyses based a fragment of the mitochondrial 16S...
The phylogenetic position of Amolops monticola, a cascade frog species known for over 150 years, remains unknown. Yet over the years new taxa have been frequently described in the ambiguously recognised A. monticola species group, based on morphology and presumed phylogenetic affinities. Here we report fresh collections of A. monticola from the Ind...
The genus Raorchestes is a large radiation of Old World tree frogs for which the Western Ghats in Peninsular India is the major center for origin and diversification. Extensive studies on this group during the past two decades have resolved long-standing taxonomic confusions and uncovered several new species, resulting in a four-fold increase in th...
The taxonomy of the Asian tree frog genus Feihyla has been in a state of flux ever since its proposal in 2006. Allocation of species to Feihyla remains confusing, particularly with respect to the closely related genus Chirixalus (formerly Chiromantis sensu lato). At the same time, several Chirixalus species are known only from cursory descriptions...
Megophrys parva is currently considered to be among the most widely dispersed species within the genus, however, recent studies have provided compelling evidence that this species represents a complex of morphologically similar, deeply divergent taxa. The focus of this paper is to take a closer look at species from Northeast India (NEI) and Banglad...
An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.
A new frog species of the genus Microhyla (Anura, Microhylidae) is described from riparian mid-elevation (860 m asl) evergreen forest in Namdapha National Park, located in the eastern Himalayan state of Arunachal Pradesh, India. The new species can be morphologically distinguished from other congeners by a suite of characters such as adult size, do...
Chemical signaling in animals often plays a central role in eliciting a variety of responses during reproductive interactions between males and females. One of the best-known vertebrate courtship pheromone systems is Sodefrin Precursor-like Factors (SPFs), a family of two-domain three-finger proteins with a female-receptivity enhancing function, cu...
We describe a new species of frog in the microhylid genus Micryletta Dubois, 1987 from Northeast India based on molecular and morphological evidence. The new species, formally described as Micryletta aishani sp. nov., is phenotypically distinct from other congeners by a suite of morphological characters such as brown to reddish-brown dorsum; dorsal...
Micryletta inornata (Boulenger 1890), the type species of the genus Micryletta, was originally described from the island of Sumatra in Indonesia. Subsequently, this species has been widely reported from Sundaland (Sumatra and Malay Peninsula), Indo-China, Northeast India and South Andaman, up to southern China and Taiwan. However, since the origina...
Anurans in Peninsular India exhibit close biogeographical links with Gondwana as well as Laurasia, often explainable by the geological history of the Indian subcontinent; its breakup from Gondwanan landmasses followed by long isolation that resulted in diversification of endemic lineages, and subsequent land connections with Asia that enabled dispe...
This study presents a systematic revision of South Asian members of the taxonomically challenging genus Microhyla Tschudi, 1838. Species relationships and diagnostic characters are determined by integrating molecular, morphological, and acoustic approaches, through which we also recognize six groups of closely related species. In addition, a new sp...
The Megophrys major species group (MMSG) is composed of typically medium to large sized frogs. Within the genus, it is the most geographically widespread clade ranging from the western Himalayas to southern Indochina. In this study, we examined in detail the extent of cryptic diversity within the MMSG-Indian populations based on molecular data (up...
Microhyla ornata, a species originally described from the southwest coast of India in 1841, was long reported to be wide-ranging throughout South, Southeast, and East Asia. Although the name M. ornata is restricted to populations from South Asia, the species is still considered to occur widely in India and its neighboring regions. To clarify the id...
Systematics and classification of Asian frogs of the genus Fejervarya and related genera (family Dicroglossidae; hereafter referred to as fejervaryan frogs) have been the subject of intensive debates in the past few years. We complement previous phylogenetic studies with analyses of concatenated sequences from 14 nuclear loci and mitochondrial gene...
The Night Frog genus Nyctibatrachus (Family Nyctibatrachidae) represents an endemic anuran lineage of the Western Ghats Biodiversity Hotspot, India. Until now, it included 28 recognised species, of which more than half were described recently over the last five years. Our amphibian explorations have further revealed the presence of undescribed spec...
Uncorrected pairwise distances between 16S mitochondrial gene sequences of the new and phylogenetically related Nyctibatrachus species
Classification matrices from the discriminant function analyses
Neighbor-Joining (NJ) tree based on Kimura-2-parameter model for 16S mitochondrial gene sequences, representing all the 28 previously known Nyctibatrachus species, seven newly sampled populations from the Western Ghats and an outgroup taxa
Scores for Discriminant function analysis of principal components resulting from nine size-corrected morphometric variables of adult male specimens
Morphometric measurements (in mm) of the adult specimens of seven new Nyctibatrachus species described in the study
Diagnostic characters for the new and morphologically related Nyctibatrachus species
Call properties of seven Nyctibatrachus species measured from single calls
Male advertisement calls of Nyctibatrachus beddomii, N. minimus and N. minor
Factor loadings, eigenvalues and percent variance from Principal component analysis based on nine size-corrected morphometric variables
Call descriptions for three previously known Nyctibatrachus species
Molecular dating studies typically need fossils to calibrate the analyses. Unfortunately, the fossil record is extremely poor or presently non-existent for many species groups, rendering such dating analysis difficult. One such group is the Asian horned frogs (Megophryinae). Sampling all generic nomina, we combined a novel ∼5kb dataset composed of...
The anuran family Ranixalidae is endemic to India, with a predominant distribution in the Western Ghats, a region that is home to several unique amphibian lineages. It is also one of the three ancient anuran families that diversified on the Indian landmass long before several larger radiations of extant frogs in this region. In recent years, ranixa...
Ventral coloration and femoral glands in ranixalid species.
(A, B) Indirana semipalmata, male (SDBDU 2015.3034) with femoral glands. (A) In life. (B) In preservation. (C) I. gundia, male (MNHN 1985.0633) with femoral glands (in preservation). (D) I. brachytarsus, male (SDBDU 2015.2931), without femoral glands (in life). (E) Sallywalkerana leptodact...
Indirana beddomii group in preservation.
From left to right: Dorsal view, ventral view, lateral view of head, ventral view of hand, ventral view of foot. (A–E) Holotype of Rana leithii (= Indirana leithii), NHM 69.8.28.50 (ex BMNH 1947.2.28.17), female. (F–J) Indirana sarojamma, SDBDU 2002.516, female.
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Indirana semipalmata group in preservation.
From left to right: Dorsal view, ventral view, lateral view of head, ventral view of hand, ventral view of foot. (A–E) Indirana chiravasi, SDBDU 2015.3087, female. (F–J) Indirana duboisi, SDBDU 2003.1086, male.
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Indirana semipalmata group in preservation.
From left to right: Dorsal view, ventral view, lateral view of head, ventral view of hand, ventral view of foot. (A–E) Holotype of Ranixalus gundia (= Indirana gundia), MNHN 1985.0633, male. (F–J) Indirana salelkari, SDBDU 2011.1330, female. (K–O) Lectotype of Rana semipalmata (= Indirana semipalmata), NH...
Uncorrected intraspecific pairwise distances between 16S mitochondrial gene sequences.
The table gives mean and standard deviation values over all pairwise comparisons among individuals or populations of a species. N is the number of individuals for each species. The original p-distances are shown in percentage.
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Uncorrected interspecific pairwise distances between 16S mitochondrial gene sequences.
The table gives mean and standard deviation values over all pairwise comparisons of individuals sequenced from the two taxa being compared. N is the number of pairwise comparisons. N1 and N2 represent number of individuals for Taxon 1 and Taxon 2, respectively. T...
Indirana beddomii group in preservation.
From left to right: Dorsal view, ventral view, lateral view of head, ventral view of hand, ventral view of foot. (A–E) Indirana tysoni, SDBDU 2012.73, female. (F–J) Indirana yadera, SDBDU 2012.2744, male.
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Collection localities of ranixalid species reported in this study.
Localities are arranged by State.
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Lateral view of head in ranixalid species.
(A–G) Indirana beddomii group. (A) I. beddomii, male (SDBDU 2010.225) and female (SDBDU 2011.961). (B) I. bhadrai, female (ZSI/WGRC/V/A887). (C) I. brachytarsus, male (SDBDU 2015.2931) and female (SDBDU 2012.814). (D) I. leithii, male (SDBDU 2014. 2515) and female (SDBDU 2014.2514). (E) I. sarojamma, male...
Dorsal (left) and ventral (right) views of head in ranixalid species.
(A–G) Indirana beddomii group. (A) I. beddomii, female (SDBDU 2011.961). (B) I. bhadrai, female (ZSI/WGRC/V/A887). (C) I. brachytarsus, female (SDBDU 2002.4091). (D) I. leithii, female (SDBDU 2002.2010). (E) I. sarojamma, female (SDBDU 2002.516). (F) I. tysoni, female (SDBDU 2012...
Indirana beddomii group in preservation.
From left to right: Dorsal view, ventral view, lateral view of head, ventral view of hand, ventral view of foot. (A–E) Lectotype of Polypedates beddomii (= Indirana beddomii), NHM 74.4.29.208 (ex BMNH 1947.2.27.72), female. (F–J) Lectotype of Polypedates brachytarsus (= Indirana brachytarsus), NHM 74.4.29.13...
Genus Sallywalkerana in preservation.
From left to right: Dorsal view, ventral view, lateral view of head, ventral view of hand, ventral view of foot. (A–E) Lectotype of Ixalus diplostictus (= Sallywalkerana diplosticta), NHM 74.4.29.1412 (ex BMNH 1947.2.2.21), female. (F–J) Lectotype of Rana leptodactyla (= Sallywalkerana leptodactyla), NHM 74.4.2...
Anurans show the highest diversity in reproductive modes of all vertebrate taxa, with a variety of associated breeding behaviours. One striking feature of anuran reproduction is amplexus. During this process, in which the male clasps the female, both individuals’ cloacae are juxtaposed to ensure successful external fertilization. Several types of a...
Anurans show the highest diversity in reproductive modes of all vertebrate taxa, with a variety of associated breeding behaviours. One striking feature of anuran reproduction is amplexus. During this process, in which the male clasps the female, both individuals’ cloacae are juxtaposed to ensure successful external fertilization. Several types of a...
The Indian Purple frog, Nasikabatrachus sahyadrensis, occupies a basal phylogenetic position among neobatrachian anurans and has a very unusual life history. Tadpoles have a large ventral oral sucker, which they use to cling to rocks in torrents, whereas metamorphs possess adaptations for life underground. The developmental changes that underlie th...
Tadpoles of the monotypic Indian dancing frog family Micrixalidae have remained obscure for over 125 years. Here we report the discovery of the elusive tadpoles of Micrixalus herrei from the sand beds of a forested stream in southern Western Ghats, and confirm their identity through DNA barcoding. These actively burrowing tadpoles lead an entirely...
The Indian Purple frog, Nasikabatrachus sahyadrensis, occupies a basal phylogenetic position among neobatrachian anurans and has a very unusual life history. Tadpoles have a large ventral oral sucker, which they use to cling to rocks in torrents, whereas metamorphs possess adaptations for life underground. The developmental changes that underlie th...
Fossorial tadpoles recorded from five of the anuran families—Arthroleptidae, Centrolenidae, Megophryidae, Microhylidae and Ranidae—and their corresponding references.
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Cranial and postcranial ossification indices versus developmental (Gosner) stage in Nasikabatrachus sahyadrensis.
(A) Skull. (B) Postcranial skeleton. In each comparison, ossification index equals the number of bones present at a given stage divided by the total number of bones present at the end of metamorphosis (skull, 11; postcranial skeleton, 7...
External morphological measurements of Nasikabatrachus sahyadrensis.
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Cranial and postcranial bones of Nasikabatrachus sahyadrensis in different developmental stages.
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Extensive surveys at and around the type locality of Ichthyophis husaini Pillai & Ravichandran, 1999 (an 'unstriped' Ich-Thyophis) in North East India between 2008 and 2014 yielded tens of striped but no unstriped specimens of Ichthyophis. Contrary to the original description, we observed a lateral stripe on the holotype of I. husaini. The holotype...
Despite renewed interest in the biogeography and evolutionary history of Old World tree frogs (Rhacophoridae), this family still includes enigmatic frogs with ambiguous phylogenetic placement. During fieldwork in four northeastern states of India, we discovered several populations of tree hole breeding frogs with oophagous tadpoles. We used molecul...
Lectotype of Polypedates jerdonii (= Frankixalus jerdonii), NHM 1947.2.7.84 (ex BMNH 1872.4.17.189).
(A) dorsal view, (B) ventral view, (C) lateral view of head, (D) ventral view of hand, (E) ventral view of foot, (F) schematic illustration of webbing on foot.
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Snout shapes of Frankixalus and Kurixalus eiffingeri.
A–C, K. eiffingeri (AMNH A14498, an adult female from Taiwan). (A) rounded in dorsal view, (B) rounded and protruding in ventral view, (C) rounded in lateral view; D–F, Frankixalus jerdonii (SDBDU 2009.1163). (D) truncate in dorsal view, (E) non-protruding semi-circular in ventral view, (F) vert...
Abbreviations.
(A) Material and methods adult morphology, (B) Material and methods larval morphology, (C) Museum and people.
(DOC)
Description of the lectotype of Polypedates jerdonii (= Frankixalus jerdonii), NMH 1947.2.7.84 (ex BMNH 1872.4.17.189), and additional specimens of F. jerdonii examined.
(A) Description of lectotype (all measurements in mm), (B) Specimens of Frankixalus jerdonii examined.
(DOC)
List of taxa and DNA sequences included in this study.
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Bayesian consensus phylogram of the total dataset showing phylogenetic relationships among 86 taxa representing all known rhacophorid genera and one outgroup species.
Numbers above and below the branches represent Bayesian Posterior Probabilities obtained for the nuclear and mitochondrial datasets, respectively.
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Morphometric measurements (in mm) of the specimens used in this study.
Status of specimens is given after the Museum number: LT- Lectotype, PL-Paralectotype, RS- Referred specimens.
(DOC)
Species boundaries of Microhyla rubra of India and Sri Lanka were assessed using the following criteria: genetic barcoding, morphology, and vocalization. We use a ca. 500 bp fragment of the 16S rRNA mitochondrial gene and show that there is an uncorrected pairwise distance of 2.7−3.2% between the Indian and Sri Lankan populations of M. rubra. We sh...
Patterns of reproductive-mode evolution in Old World tree frogs (Anura, Rhacophoridae). —Zoologica Scripta, 00, 000–000. The Old World tree frogs (Anura: Rhacophoridae), with 387 species, display a remarkable diversity of reproductive modes – aquatic breeding, terrestrial gel nesting, terrestrial foam nesting and terrestrial direct development. The...
Despite considerable progress in unravelling the phylogenetic relationships of microhylid frogs, relationships among subfamilies remain largely unstable and many genera are not demonstrably monophyletic. Here, we used five alternative combinations of DNA sequence data (ranging from seven loci for 48 taxa to up to 73 loci for as many as 142 taxa) ge...
Quantitative descriptions of animal vocalizations can inform an understanding of their evolutionary functions, the mechanisms for their production and perception, and their potential utility in taxonomy, population monitoring, and conservation. The goal of this study was to provide the first acoustical and statistical analysis of the advertisement...
Quantitative descriptions of animal vocalizations can inform an understanding of their evolutionary functions, the mechanisms for their production and perception, and their potential utility in taxonomy, population monitoring, and conservation. The goal of this study was to provide the first acoustical and statistical analysis of the advertisement...
Abstract
Northeast India is a well-established region of biological importance but remains poorly understood with regards to the species level identifications of many of its extant amphibians. In this study we examined small sized frogs from the genus Megophrys recently collected from remote and suburban forests in the northeast Indian states of Me...
A taxonomic review of the monogeneric northeast Indian caecilian family Chikilidae is presented based on 64 specimens. Chikila fulleri (Alcock, 1904), known previously only from a single specimen collected more than 100 years ago, is rediagnosed and characterised based on recent collections. We describe three additional species new to science, Chik...
A taxonomic revision of the Western Ghats species from the genus Rhacophorus is presented. Based on museum studies and new collections from localities spanning the known range of Western Ghats Rhacophorus, we review the four known species of this genus, their type specimens, current taxonomic status and their geographic distribution on the basis of...
