Maindroniidae
| Maindroniidae | |
|---|---|
| Maindronia bashagardensis | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Arthropoda |
| Class: | Insecta |
| Order: | Zygentoma |
| Family: | Maindroniidae Escherich, 1905 |
| Genus: | Maindronia Bouvier, 1897 |
| Species | |
| |
Maindroniidae is a very small family of silverfish, basal insects belonging to the order Zygentoma. It contains just a single genus, Maindronia, and a handful of species.
Four species of these insects are found in some of the driest deserts on Earth: in Sudan, the Arabian Peninsula, and the Atacama Desert on the west coast of Chile. The distribution of these closely related species suggests that Maindronia is a Gondwanan relict group. A new species in this family was recently discovered in Hormozgan province, Iran.
Maindronia currently comprises four described species:
- Maindronia bashagardensis Smith & Molero-Baltanás, 2020 – Iran
- Maindronia beieri Schremmer, 1964 – Sudan
- Maindronia mascatensis Bouvier, 1897 – Oman and UAE
- Maindronia neotropicalis Bouvier, 1897 – Peru and Chile
Recent findings from a phylogenetic study using the Cytochrome c oxidase subunit I and the 18S genes showed that Maindronia neotropicalis, inhabiting the Chilean Atacama desert, is in fact an assemblage of five genetic lineages that diverged from a common ancestor around 15 million years ago. All of these five lineages are likely well-separated species, and they await formal description.