Abstract
We provide an integrative taxonomic analysis of the Lipinia vittigera species complex from mainland Southeast Asia. Based on examination of external morphology, color pattern, and 681 base pairs of the cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) mitochondrial gene, we demonstrate the presence of four morphologically distinct lineages of Lipinia in Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and Malaysia, showing a sequence divergence ranging 15.5%–20.4%. All discovered lineages are discretely diagnosable from one another by a combination of scalation traits and color patterns. A review of the published distribution data and a re-examination of available type material revealed the following results：(1) distribution of L. vittigera (Boulenger, 1894) sensu stricto is restricted to Sundaland and the Thai-Malay Peninsula south of the Isthmus of Kra; (2) L. microcercus (Boettger, 1901) stat. nov. is elevated to full species rank; the species has a wide distribution from central and southern Vietnam across Cambodia to eastern Thailand; we regard Lygosoma vittigerum kronfanum Smith, 1922 and Leiolopisma pranensis Cochran, 1930 as its junior synonyms; (3) Lipinia trivittata sp. nov. occurs in hilly areas of southern Vietnam, Cambodia, and eastern Thailand; and (4) Lipinia vassilievi sp. nov. is currently known only from a narrow area along the Vietnamese-Cambodian border in the foothills of the central Annamite Mountain Range. We further provide an identification key for Lipinia occurring in mainland Southeast Asia.
Highlights
The scincid genus Lipinia Gray, 1845 is an assemblage of arboreal and terrestrial lizards currently comprising at least 29358 Science Press valid species (Grismer et al, 2016; Uetz & Hošek, 2019)
Both the Bayesian inference (BI) and maximum likelihood (ML) phylogenetic analyses resulted in essentially similar topologies
Phylogenetic relationships within the genus Lipinia remained fundamentally unresolved in our analyses, whereas monophyly of species-level groups was highly supported (1.0/100, hereafter node support values are given for BI posterior probability (PP)/ML BS, respectively) (Figure 3)
Summary
The scincid genus Lipinia Gray, 1845 is an assemblage of arboreal and terrestrial lizards currently comprising at least 29. Cochran (1930) analyzed the herpetological collections from Siam and described a new species of the genus Leiolopisma Duméril & Bibron from Pran ( Pran-Buri, Prachuap Khiri Khan, Thailand) and Doi Angka (Chiang Mai, Thailand) – L. pranensis, noting its affinity to L. vittigerum, to which it differed in midbody scale row count, number of subdigital lamellae, and distinct coloration.
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