''Anelosimus buffoni'' is a species of

tangle-web spiders Theridiidae, also known as the tangle-web spiders, cobweb spiders and comb-footed spiders, is a large family of araneomorph spiders first described by Carl Jakob Sundevall in 1833. This diverse, globally distributed family includes over 3,000 spec ...

in the Madagascar group of the genus ''Anelosimus''. It is known only from

Périnet Special Reserve Andasibe-Mantadia National Park is a 155 square kilometre protected area, located about 150 km east of Antananarivo, consisting principally of primary growth forest in the Alaotra-Mangoro Region in eastern Madagascar. The park's elevation ...

Toamasina Province The Toamasina Province is a former provinces of Madagascar, province of Madagascar with an area of 71,911 km2. It had a population of 2,855,600 (2004). Its capital was Toamasina, the most important seaport of the country. The province was also ...

, Madagascar. Adults of the species have a total length of 4.1mm, and is physically similar to several other Madagascar group spiders, particularly '' A. andasibe'' and '' A. wallacei''. It is primarily diagnosed using genetics. The species is named for

Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (; 7 September 1707 – 16 April 1788) was a French Natural history, naturalist, mathematician, and cosmology, cosmologist. He held the position of ''intendant'' (director) at the ''Jardin du Roi'', now ca ...

Specimens

There are only two specimens of this spider in existing collections. Although multiple specimens were reported to have been collected, only two exist in collections; the rest were reported lost in transit when the co-discoverer, Ingi Agnarsson, brought his research materials from

University of Puerto Rico The University of Puerto Rico (Spanish language, Spanish: ''Universidad de Puerto Rico;'' often shortened to UPR) is the main List of state and territorial universities in the United States, public university system in the Commonwealth (U.S. i ...

University of Vermont The University of Vermont and State Agricultural College, commonly referred to as the University of Vermont (UVM), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Burlington, Vermont, United States. Foun ...

. The two specimens which remain were partially destroyed for

DNA barcoding DNA barcoding is a method of species identification using a short section of DNA from a specific gene or genes. The premise of DNA barcoding is that by comparison with a reference library of such DNA sections (also called " sequences"), an indiv ...

Specimens

References

Further reading