''Quasipaa'' is a genus of

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely semiaquatic group of short-bodied, tailless amphibian vertebrates composing the order (biology), order Anura (coming from the Ancient Greek , literally 'without tail'). Frog species with rough ski ...

s in the family

Dicroglossidae The frog family Dicroglossidae occurs in tropical and subtropical regions of Asia and Africa, with most genera and species being found in Asia. The common name of the family is fork-tongued frogs. The Dicroglossidae were previously considered to ...

. The genus has no established common name, but many individual species are referred to as ''spiny frogs''. They occur in

East East is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the fact that ea ...

and

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, southeastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and northwest of the Mainland Au ...

, from

Thailand Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...

and

Cambodia Cambodia, officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. It is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the north, and Vietnam to the east, and has a coastline ...

to southern and eastern

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

Taxonomy

''Quasipaa'' was first proposed as a

subgenus In biology, a subgenus ( subgenera) is a taxonomic rank directly below genus. In the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, a subgeneric name can be used independently or included in a species name, in parentheses, placed between the ge ...

of ''Paa'' (now considered to belong to ''

Nanorana ''Nanorana'' is a genus of dicroglossid frogs. They are found in Asia, from the Himalayan region of northern Pakistan and northern India, Nepal, and western China east to montane southern China and southeast to Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, and north ...

''). It was subsequently raised to the level of genus, and

molecular phylogenetic Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to ...

analyses have corroborated the

monophyly In biological cladistics for the classification of organisms, monophyly is the condition of a taxonomic grouping being a clade – that is, a grouping of organisms which meets these criteria: # the grouping contains its own most recent comm ...

of ''Quasipaa''. Many individual species were originally described in genus ''

Rana Rana may refer to: Astronomy * Rana (crater), a crater on Mars * Delta Eridani or Rana, a star Films * Rana (2012 film), an Indian Kannada-language action drama * Rana, a 1998 Telugu-language action film directed by A. Kodandarami Reddy * R ...

''. Even after splitting the very wide ''Rana'' into smaller taxa, frogs now in ''Quasipaa'' continued to belong to the

true frog True frogs is the common name for the frog family (biology), family Ranidae. They have the widest distribution of any frog family. They are abundant throughout most of the world, occurring on all continents except Antarctica. The true frogs are p ...

family (Ranidae), at times as subfamily Dicroglossinae, until Dicroglossinae was raised to the family level (i.e.,

). The taxonomy of Dicroglossidae is far from settled yet.

Species

There are 11 species in this genus:

Conservation and use

The

International Union for Conservation of Nature The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the stat ...

(IUCN) has assessed ten species of ''Quasipaa''. One them is "

Data deficient A data deficient (DD) species is one which has been categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as offering insufficient information for a proper assessment of conservation status to be made. This does not necessaril ...

", another one "

Near threatened A near-threatened species is a species which has been Conservation status, categorized as "Near Threatened" (NT) by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as that may be vulnerable to Endangered species, endangerment in the ne ...

, and the remaining ones are either " Vulnerable" or "

Endangered An endangered species is a species that is very likely to become extinct in the near future, either worldwide or in a particular political jurisdiction. Endangered species may be at risk due to factors such as habitat loss, poaching, inv ...

". ''Quasipaa'' can be relatively large frogs, and many are collected for consumption. They are also threatened by habitat loss.

References

{{Authority control Amphibians of Asia Dicroglossidae