Alireza Zamani

Zamani, A., Szabó, K. & Szűts, T. (2025). Persian treasures: integrative taxonomy reveals high species’ diversity of ladybird spiders (Araneae: Eresidae: Eresus). Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 204(4): zlaf086.

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🔴 Eresus robin — A nod to the DC Comics character Robin, the European robin (Erithacus rubecula), and the close relationship between the holotype and a juvenile female collected from Batman Province, Türkiye.

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🔴 Eresus rezaci — Named after Dr. Milan Řezáč, a Czech arachnologist.

🔴 Eresus agrinus — Derived from the Kurdish word for ‘fire,’ this name was selected through a two-stage public survey.

🔴 Eresus marmoratus — From the Latin marmoratus, meaning ‘marbled’.

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🔴 Eresus surena — Named in honour of Rustaham Suren (d. 53 or 52 BC), a prominent Parthian spahbed (general).

🔴 Eresus sparabara — Named from the Old Persian word meaning ‘shield bearer’.

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In our new paper, co-authored with Krisztián Szabó and @tszuts.bsky.social, we present an integrative taxonomic study of ladybird spiders, and describe seven beautiful new species from Iran:

🔴 Eresus athanatoi — Named after the Persian Immortals, the elite warriors of the Achaemenid army.

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These tarantulas may have evolved huge genitalia to fend off bloodthirsty females Tarantulas, like all spiders, don’t have penises; they have palps. And these ones are massive.

An article on National Geographic, on our recent new genus and species of tarantulas from the Horn of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula:

Four new species of tarantulas with "unusual male sex organs" discovered by @alirezazamani.bsky.social et al, just published in ZooKeys!

Read more here: blog.pensoft.net/2025/08/04/n...

I’m thrilled to be a co-recipient of the 2024 E.O. Wilson Research Prize, alongside my colleagues Rick C West and William Lamar:

t.co/0dugDTcNW0

Copulatory Mechanics Reveals a Self‐Bracing Mechanism via a Femoral Apophysis in Funnel Weavers (Araneae, Agelenidae) In this study, we tested the hypothesis that femoral apophyses function in self-bracing in Anatextrix monstrabilis, one of the two species of a recently discovered lineage of agelenid spiders charact...

Check out our latest publication on the copulatory mechanics of Anatextrix monstrabilis, which likely has the most highly modified male palpal femur among all spiders:

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Kiitos paljon Tapani!

Alireza Zamani haluaa sinunkin ihastuvan hämähäkkeihin, sillä ihmiskunta ei selviä ilman niitä Turkulainen tutkija Alireza Zamani löysi uuden hämähäkkilajin ja inspiroi nyt nuoria tutkijoita ympäri maailmaa.

Here is a video / photo interview that I did with Yle, Finland's national public broadcasting company, about my background and research on spiders 🕸🕷

yle.fi/a/74-20123947

@lbrianpatrick.bsky.social there is Tegenaria zamanii, found in a cave in northern Iran 😊

My final paper for 2024 was published today. In total, this year I co-authored 13 papers and co-described a genus and 35 species. The specimens for these new species were collected from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Ecuador, Georgia, Greece, Iran, Iraq, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkey, and Uzbekistan.

Identifying new animal and plant species is a race against time Read our special feature where you can move forward in the article by tapping the side of the photo or the arrows below.

Here is a feature article in Aurora, the online magazine of the University of Turku, on new species discoveries made by researchers from the Biodiversity Unit:

www.utu.fi/en/news/auro...

Meet Pseudanapis yasunica Zamani & Marusik, 2024 from Ecuador! 🇪🇨 With a total body length of only 0.93 mm, this tiny spider is officially the 200th species of arachnids that I have described and named!

Emil's (not on Bluesky) plus my and @alirezazamani.bsky.social article is now online 🥳

Quick comparison of two different trap types. Both work, ramp traps caught more ants 🐜, beetles 🪲 etc; and pitfalls more myriapods .

Nothing world-shattering, but useful data for anyone choosing traps.

Gekko, lintuhämähäkki ja loispistiäinen – suomalaistutkijat löysivät yli 40 uutta eläinlaji... Turun yliopiston biodiversiteettiyksikkö on kohonnut nopeasti maailman johtavien tuntemattomia eläinlajeja nimeävien tutkimuslaitosten joukkoon.

Nyt yksikkömme tuotos on ylessäkin!

Mukana m.m. @ilarisaaksjarvi.bsky.social pistiäinen ja tietenkin @alirezazamani.bsky.social lta vieläkin enemmän hämähäkkilajeja. Itseltäni ei tänä vuonna yhtäkään lajia.

Lajien kanssa päästään käyntiin vasta kun ne on kuvattu, joten perustavanlaatuista työtä.

Article (with much improved figures) just got accepted 🥳

Basically Emil's article (not on bsky), but I and @alirezazamani.bsky.social also took part. Sneak peak of the dataset while waiting for the article to appear.

Thanks a lot for the invite!