Mohammad-Javad Malek Hosseini

University of Ljubljana · Department of Biology

Four obligate cave fish species have been recorded from Zagros in Iran: Garra typhlops (Bruun and Kaiser, 1944), G. lorestanensis (Mousavi-Sabet and Eagderi, 2016), G. tashanensis (Mousavi-Sabet, Vatandoust, Fatemi and Eagderi, 2016) and Eidinemacheilus smithi (Greenwood, 1976). So far, the only known locality of the latter has been the Loven cave....

With only 43 described stygobionts and only two isopod species the obligate groundwater fauna of Iran, a vast country with over 10% of limestone surface, is inadequately known. Here, we report the discovery of Asellus ismailsezarii sp. nov. from Zagros mountains, the first eyeless and depigmented asellid isopod from Iran. The new species is morphol...

Subterranean environments of Iran are severely understudied. Here, we advance the knowledge of Iranian cave biodiversity by following three goals: (i) to investigate Iranian caves for troglobiotic beetles; (ii) to understand the phylogenetic relationships and estimate the timing of Iranian cave colonization by Duvalius Delarouzée, 1859; and (iii) t...

We report on a new stygobiont truncatelloid gastropod from the sulfdic ponds of Tashan Cave in the Zagros Mountains of Southwest Iran. The hydrogen sulfde habitat resembles those hitherto known for gastropods from sulfde-rich caves in Romania, Italy and Greece. The newly described genus Trogloiranica n. gen. with a newly described T. tashanica n. s...

Records of the genus Niphargus are quite new in Iran. Recent investigations of subterranean cave-dwelling fauna revealed a diversity of new taxa, including several new niphargid species. All of these new findings have been recorded from the north and north-west of the country, in Alborz and Northern Zagros regions. This paper describes a cave speci...

A new stenasellid isopod is described from Tashan Cave, Khuzestan Province, south-west Iran, belonging to the genus Stenasellus Dollfus, 1897. The first recorded species of Stenasellidae from Iran, Stenasellustashanicussp. n. , is diagnosed by the presence of antennae with a minute squama bearing paired, long, robust setae; a maxilliped endite with...

Agelenidae is a species rich and globally-distributed spider family comprising 1274 species in 77 genera (World Spider Catalog 2018). In Iran, this family is currently represented by eight species in four genera (Zamani et al. 2018). Being the second largest genus of the family (after Draconarius Ovtchinnikov, 1999), Tegenaria Latreille, 1804, curr...

Background The best-known dangerous spiders belong to the six genera. The genus Loxosceles or violin spiders are well known for their ability to cause skin necrosis or loxoscelism. All Loxosceles species have medical importance due to their necrotizing venom. The present article reports the occurrence of L. rufescens in Charkhab Cave, south of Iran...

Understanding subterranean biodiversity is important, yet vast regions of the world remain poorly explored. Here, we provide the first step towards cataloguing the subterranean arthropods of Iran. After review and analysis of the available literature and the examination of samples collected by us from Iranian caves, we listed 89 cavernicolous speci...

This paper presents a part of the study conducted on cave fauna in Kohgiluyeh & Boyer-Ahmad and Fars provinces, South West and South of Iran. Eleven caves were investigated and seven species of bats were examined for identifying the ectoparasites.We found six species of ticks (Acari: Ixodidae) and four mites (Acari: Spinturnicidae and Macronyssidae...

In a comprehensive study on cave-dwelling animals five species of Carabidae were caught in four caves in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province in southwest of Iran. Duvalius kileri nov. sp. is described from Kiler cave. Duvalius kileri nov. sp. is the second apterous Duvalius species from Iran and is compared with Duvalius mohammadzadehi MUILWIJK & F...

A partial account of the results of a study on the cave-dwelling spider fauna of Kohgiluyeh & Boyer-Ahmad and Fars provinces, in southwestern and southern Iran, is presented. Ten caves were investigated, about 75 spider specimens were collected and 11 species were identified, of which Metellina orientalis (Spassky, 1932) (Tetragnathidae) is recorde...

Chiraziulus is a highly disjunct, hitherto monotypic genus of cambalid millipedes, geographically isolated in Iran by more than 7000 km from its presumed closest relatives in East Asia and North America. Recent fieldwork in caves of Iran has provided several specimens of this genus, allowing the description of Chiraziulus troglopersicus sp. nov. Th...

A new species of the hard-bodied oonopid genus Trilacuna Tong & Li is described from a cave in Kohgiluyeh and BoyerAhmad Province, southwestern Iran. Trilacuna qarzi sp. nov. is the first troglobiont species known of the genus, and is also the fifth oonopid species to be reported from Iran. Relationships of this new species are briefly discussed in...

In this study we surveyed 7 caves of Fars province and several specimens of beetles have been collected from some Coleoptera families such as Staphylinidae, Carabidae, Tenebrionidae, Salpingidae, Ptinidae, then samples transferred to laboratory and identified at species or genus level using related keys and connections to international specialists...

The Ptinidae or spider beetles, is a worldwide family of beetles especially distributed in the subtropical and temperate zones including Iran. The species Niptus hololeucus (Faldermann, 1836) collected from Kangohar cave in Fars Province, southern Iran, is described as new record for Iran with illustrations of adult as well as male and female genit...

Cave-dwelling terrestrial isopods from the province of Kohgiluyeh and Boyerahmad, southwestern Iran, are reported here. These include three accidental and one troglobitic species namely Protracheoniscus gakalicus n. sp., which is also the first recorded troglobitic species from the genus Protracheoniscus. The new species is readily distinguished by...

The pseudoscorpion genus Megachernes is recorded for the first time in Iran. Adults and protonymphs of Megachernes pavlovskyi Redikorzev, 1949 were found in a porcupine nest and under stones in the Deh Sheikh (Pataveh) cave, Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad Province, Southwest Iran. A short description of the species is provided, based on the main morpho...