New Fish Species Discovered in the Persian Gulf
WANA (Oct 12) – A research team from Tarbiat Modares University has discovered and globally registered a new species of fish belonging to the Sillaginidae family, naming it after the Persian Gulf in honor of its place of discovery.
The species, now officially registered in the ZooBank zoological database under the name Sillago persica, was identified from the coastal waters of the Persian Gulf (its type locality).
The fish was previously classified within a similar group but was confirmed as a distinct species following comprehensive geometric morphometric analyses of otolith (ear bone) structures, body shape assessments, swim bladder morphology studies, and genetic sequencing using species delimitation models.
This internationally recognized achievement has been published in the prestigious scientific journal ZooKeys. The holotype specimen is preserved in the Aquatic Animal Collection of Tarbiat Modares University under the accession code TAC1245F.
The discovery and classification were conducted by an Iranian research team led by Dr. Mohammad Sadegh Alavi Yeganeh, Associate Professor of Marine Biology at Tarbiat Modares University, in collaboration with Dr. Hashem Khandan Barani of the International Hamoun Wetland Research Center (a PhD graduate in Marine Biology from Tarbiat Modares University) and Dr. Mehdi Ghanbari Fardi, Associate Professor of Biology at the University of Sistan and Baluchestan.
New Fish Species Discovered in the Persian Gulf. Social media/ WANA News Agency
