Arrup asiaticus
Arrup asiaticus is a species of soil centipede in the family Mecistocephalidae. This centipede is one of only two species of Arrup found in Central Asia. This centipede is also one of only five species in the family Mecistocephalidae found in Central Asia. This species features 41 pairs of legs in each sex and can reach 25 mm in length.
Discovery
This species was first described in 1975 by the Russian myriapodologist Lidia P. Titova. She based the original description of this species on a large sample of specimens, including 11 males, 15 females, and 35 juveniles. Four specimens, including the male holotype, were found in 1966 in the Trans-Ili Alatau mountain range in Kazakhstan. Another four specimens were found in 1965 in Istaravshan in the Sughd Region of northern Tajikistan. The other specimens were found in 1970 in the Sary-Chelek Nature Reserve in Kyrgyzstan.Taxonomy
Titova originally described this species under the name Nodocephalus asiaticus. In 2003, the biologists Donatella Foddai, Lucio Bonato, Luis Alberto Pereira, and Alessandro Minelli moved this species into the genus Arrup. Authorities now consider Nodocephalus to be a junior synonym of Arrup.Description
This species features 41 leg-bearing segments and can reach 25 mm in length. The body is light yellow, but the head and forcipules are a darker brownish red. The dorsal surface of the head features no transverse frontal line. The areolate area on the anterior part of the clypeus is four to five times longer than the smooth areas on the posterior part of the clypeus. A wide longitudinal areolate strip runs down the middle of the clypeus and separates the two plagulae. The coxosternite of the first maxillae and the coxosternite of the second maxillae are each undivided. Each of the second maxillae ends in a pair of setae instead of a claw.The first article of the forcipule features a distal tooth that is large and dark, and the ultimate article features a sharp basal tooth, but the third article features only a tiny tubercle, and the second article features neither a tooth nor a tubercle. The sternites on the anterior trunk segments feature a longitudinal groove down the middle. The sternite on the last leg-bearing segment is shaped like a triangle that is twice as wide as long and rounded at the posterior end. The basal element of each of the ultimate legs can feature up to ten or eleven pores on the ventral and lateral surfaces. The ultimate legs lack claws, and the telson features anal pores.
This species exhibits many traits that characterize the genus Arrup. For example, this species features 41 leg pairs and an areolate stripe down the middle of the clypeus between two plagulae that do not extend to the lateral margins of the clypeus. Furthermore, as in other species in this genus, no spicula project from the pleurites on the sides of the head, both the coxosternite of the first maxillae and the coxosternite of the second maxillae are undivided, the sternites feature a longitudinal groove in the middle, and the first article of the forcipule features only a distal tooth.
This species shares a more extensive set of distinctive traits with the only other species of Arrup described from Central Asia, A. edentulus. For example, in each of these species, the distal tooth on the first article of the forcipule is large and dark, the ultimate article features a basal tooth, and the second article features neither a tooth nor a tubercle. Furthermore, in each of these species, the second maxillae lack claws, and the basal elements of the ultimate legs only feature pores on the ventral and lateral surfaces, not on the dorsal surfaces.
The species A. asiaticus can be distinguished from A. edentulus, however, based on other traits. For example, the areolate part of the clypeus is about four or five times longer than the plagulae in A. asiaticus but only about two or three times longer than the plagulae in A. edentulus. Furthermore, the areolate stripe between the plagulae is wide in A. asiaticus but narrow in A. edentulus. Moreover, the third article of the forcipule features a small tubercle in A. asiaticus but neither a tubercle nor a tooth in ''A. edentulus.''