Taxonomic accounts and phylogenetic positions of the Far East Asian centipedes Scolopocryptops elegans and S. curtus (Chilopoda: Scolopendromorpha)

Abstract

The epigean centipede genus Scolopocryptops Newport, 1844 consists of two monophyletic lineages, the “Asian/North American” and “Neotropical/Afrotropical” groups. Most of the “Asian/North American” species bear the complete sulcus/sulci along the lateral margin of the cephalic plate and sternites lacking sulci, whereas Japanese Scolopocryptops elegans (Takakuwa, 1937) bears short lateral sulci on the cephalic plate and Taiwanese Scolopocryptops curtus (Takakuwa, 1939) lacks the cephalic marginal sulci, and both species bear a longitudinal sternal sulcus. The taxonomic accounts of S. elegans and S. curtus were revisited in this study based on newly collected specimens. We found that these two species share a characteristic of the second maxilla, that they lack the transparent margin on the dorsal brush, which distinguishes them from other “Asian/North American” species. Scolopocryptops elegans and S. curtus can be distinguished from each other by the characters of their antennal articles, cephalic plate, forcipular coxosternite, tergite 23, and coxopleuron. Phylogenetic analyses using nuclear 28S ribosomal RNA and mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I sequences confirmed that S. elegans and S. curtus are closely related and form a single clade sister to a clade comprising all the other “Asian/North American” Scolopocryptops species.