The picture shows a specimen of the orthodontic mold of the solitary dragon. Courtesy of Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Kunming, June 28 (Xinhua) -- A reporter learned from the Kunming Institute of Zoology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences on the 28th that the Southeast Asian Wildlife Diversity Research Group of the Institute confirmed through morphological comparison that the "Tibetan eel" distributed in the Small River and the Dulong River, a tributary of the Irrawaddy River, should be a new species of fish of the genus Urugi, and named it Exostoma dulongensis. The results, titled Exostoma dulongensis, a new glyptosternine catfish from the Irrawaddy basin, Yunnan, China (Siluriformes: Sisoridae), were recently published in zootaxa, an international journal of taxonomy.
According to reports, the urusa belongs to the order Thrush, the family Lycaenidae, the genus E. Dracaena, and the E. ray that is distributed in the Daying River. Ericinum is most similar, but the distinction between the solitary and hedgehog-like rays and other closely related species can be separated by a combination of morphological characteristics. The ventral fin of the solitary manta does not reach the anus, resembling the ventral fin of the hedgehog to the anus; the snout of the solitary manta must reach or exceed the posterior orbit of the eye, and the anterior distance of the solitary manta rays does not reach the middle of the orbit; the anterior distance of the anus of the solitary manta accounts for 70.9%–80.1% of the body length; the anterior distance of the anus of the hedgehog is 67.7%–70.5%; the distance from the dorsal fin of the solitary cat to the fat fin is 13.5%–23.8% of the body length; and the distance from the dorsal fin to the fat fin of the oedip is 8.0%–12.0% of the body length.
The picture shows the living body of the dragon ray. Courtesy of Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
This study was supported by the Center for Southeast Asian Biodiversity Research of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Lancang-Mekong River Cooperation Special Fund (Lancang-Mekong River Basin Biodiversity Monitoring and Network Construction Project), the National Science Foundation's Gaoligong Mountain Biological Survey Project, and the National Geographic Society of the United States. (End)