New spider cricket discovered from Chhattisgarh
GS PAPER III: Science and Technology- developments and their applications and effects in everyday life.
Context: The new subgenus is named Jayanti after Professor Jayant Biswas, one of the leading cave explorers in the country.
- Jayanti has become the twelfth subgenus, or species, of cricket identified under the genus Arachnomimus Saussure, 1897.
- Found in the Kurra caves of Chhattisgarh in April 2021 by a team of zoologists.
- Arachnomimus is the genus name given to crickets that resembled spiders.
Why is the discovery significant?
- Crickets are noticeable for their loud calls, especially at night. Male crickets produce this sound by rubbing their wings against each other to attract females.
- Interestingly, males of the new Jayanti subgenus cannot produce sound and their females don’t have ears.
- The crickets were found on the walls of the Kurra caves which don’t have light inside. They may be communicating by beating their abdomen or any other body part on the cave walls. Vibrational communication is one of the softest but fastest modes of signal transmission.
- Further studies on their skills of vibrational communication may help in designing hearing aids for human which can capture quietest signals and amplify to an audible hearing range.
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