The animal world is one of the areas that hides the most mysteries for science. And, despite the existence of approximately one million cataloged fauna species, it is estimated that 80% remain undiscovered. This is confirmed by a study published by the journal Plos Biology, which estimates that there are 7.7 million species of animals present on Earth. Nature still has surprising treasures to reveal to us in the oceans, jungles and even the poles.
There are many scientific expeditions that have delved into the depths of tropical jungles, the seabed and remote mountains in search of unknown species. This work not only expands our knowledge about the planet’s biodiversity, but also contributes to understanding the variety of habitats and ecosystems and the challenges for their conservation. Below, we detail some of the most recent discoveries of new animal species.
Research published in the Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society announced the discovery of up to five new species of gymnuras, small animals from the hedgehog family, but with soft fur that replaces the quills. The main author of the study, Arlo Hinckley – who developed his thesis at the Doñana-CSIC Biological Station – describes them as a mix between a mouse and a shrew.
The discovery of these species of five Hylomys species in Southeast Asia has been possible thanks to the application of novel genetic and morphological analyzes based on the comparison of the DNA of specimens preserved in 14 collections of natural history museums with that of the new specimens identified.
Last year, Chinese scientists discovered a new ‘mysterious’ species of pangolin called Manis mysteria, thanks to genomic data extracted from the scales of this curious animal. Eight species of pangolin have been classified at this time and are on the Red List of Threatened Species of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), victims of poaching and illegal trade for their skin and meat. In fact, the discovery of this new species has been possible thanks to a seizure of specimens in the Chinese regions of Yunnan and Hong Kong.
An expedition from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography that skirted the Antarctic coast last year discovered Promachocrinus fragarius, a species that, although it looks like a jellyfish, is actually a feathered starfish. This invertebrate stands out for its strawberry-shaped appearance with twenty arms and lives at a depth of between 65 and 1,200 meters below sea level.
