''Ayna'' is a

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unisp ...

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

of air-breathing

land snail A land snail is any of the numerous species of snail that live on land, as opposed to the sea snails and freshwater snails. ''Land snail'' is the common name for terrestrial molluscs, terrestrial gastropod mollusks that have gastropod shell, shel ...

terrestrial Terrestrial refers to things related to land or the planet Earth, as opposed to extraterrestrial. Terrestrial may also refer to: * Terrestrial animal, an animal that lives on land opposed to living in water, or sometimes an animal that lives on o ...

gastropod Gastropods (), commonly known as slugs and snails, belong to a large Taxonomy (biology), taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda (). This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, freshwater, and fro ...

mollusk Mollusca is a phylum of protostomic invertebrate animals, whose members are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 76,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized, making it the second-largest animal phylum after Arthropoda. The ...

s in the family

Enidae Enidae is a family of air-breathing land snails, terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusks.MolluscaBase eds. (2020). MolluscaBase. Enidae B. B. Woodward, 1903 (1880). Accessed through: World Register of Marine Species at: http://www.marinespecies ...

. The sole species in the genus is ''Ayna mienisi''. It was described as ''Zebrina'' (''Ramusculus'') ''mienisi''. The genus ''

Ramusculus ''Brephulopsis'' is a genus of gastropods belonging to the family Enidae. The species of this genus are found in near Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying betw ...

'' however is a monotypic genus only distantly related to ''Ayna''. The closest relative of ''Ayna'' is probably ''

Clausilioides ''Clausilioides'' is a genus of air-breathing land snails, terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusks in the family Enidae. This species in this genus are obligate rock-dwellers that inhabit a limited area in northeastern Turkey. Species Species ...

''. ''A. mienisi'' is a chirally enantiomorphic species. This means that some specimens have sinistral (left-coiled), others dextral (right-coiled) shells. The sinistral and dextral specimens form "clear" populations but can by found

sympatric In biology, two closely related species or populations are considered sympatric when they exist in the same geographic area and thus frequently encounter each other. An initially interbreeding population that splits into two or more distinct spe ...

ally as well. The sinistral specimens were described as a species (''Ramusculus laevitortus'' Schütt, 1995) differs from the dextral ''Ramusculus mienisi''. The species inhabits a relatively small area in

Erzurum Province Erzurum Province () is a province and metropolitan municipality in the Eastern Anatolia Region of Turkey. Its area is 25,006 km2, and its population is 749,754 (2022). The capital of the province is the city of Erzurum. It is the fourth lar ...

, northeastern

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

References

Enidae Endemic fauna of Turkey Monotypic gastropod genera Gastropods described in 1986 {{Enidae-stub