Abstract
(1) Background: Scorpions (Arthropoda: Arachnida) represent a diverse group of invertebrates, accounting for a significant proportion of earth’s predators and ecosystems’ modulators. Surviving mostly in hardly reachable nests, and representing key hazards to human health, they attracted major interest for characterizing their eco-, morpho-, and genotypes. (2) Methods: Four scorpion species were collected from the New Valley governorate in Upper Egypt, where a high level of scorpionism and related neurological symptoms are found, that were Leiurus quinquestriatus, Androctonus amoreuxi, Orthochirus innesi, Buthacus leptochelys. They were DNA barcoded, genetically and phylogenetically analyzed through PCR amplification and sequencing of the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit 1 (COI) gene hypervariable 5′ region. (3) Results: New, morphologically authenticated scorpion barcodes could be added to the barcoding databases. However, several discrepancies and barcode database inadequacies could be revealed. Moreover, taxon-specific patterns for nitrogenous bases’ distribution could be identified, resulting in a significantly high percentage of COI barcode guanine in scorpionids, in comparison to araneids and opilions. (4) Conclusions: For a group of animals where both cryptic speciation and a high risk of human envenomation are evident, the findings of the current study strongly recommend continuous and comprehensive research efforts dealing with morphogenetic authentication for different species of scorpions.
Highlights
Introduction published maps and institutional affilScorpions are arachnid arthropods of key environmental and medical importance.They constitute one of the oldest animal groups in the world, with a fossil history dated to more than 300 million years ago
The aim of the current study was to complete the morphogenetic authentication of these species using DNA barcoding, a task that seems crucial since some of these species are the most notorious in terms of scorpionism, especially in the New Valley governorate, and in Egypt in general [12,23]
These samples belonged to four species: Leiurus quinquestriatus, Androctonus amoreuxi, Orthochirus Innesi, Buthacus leptochelys (Figure 2)
Summary
Scorpions are arachnid arthropods of key environmental and medical importance They constitute one of the oldest animal groups in the world, with a fossil history dated to more than 300 million years ago. Since scorpions are predators of small arthropods and feed infrequently across multi-year lifespans, their high biomass could be attributed to the depressed metabolic rate [4]. They exhibit long life spans, (2–25 years, with a mean of 4–8 years), late maturation period (6 months to 7 years), long gestation period (1.5 months to 2 years), and a characteristic pattern of maternal care of young [5].
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