| Selenops Temporal range: Palaeogene–present PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N | |
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| Selenops sp. | |
Scientific classification 
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| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Arthropoda |
| Subphylum: | Chelicerata |
| Class: | Arachnida |
| Order: | Araneae |
| Infraorder: | Araneomorphae |
| Family: | Selenopidae |
| Genus: | Selenops Latreille, 1819 |
| Diversity | |
| 132 species | |
Selenops is a spider genus that is found in many arid regions of the world, but some species may also be found in some cooler and even mountainous regions. Most of the 132 species (as of May. 2021) are hard to visually distinguish, and requires study of their finer anatomy.
S. australiensis is found on or under dry bark in Australia. The female reaches 9mm, the male 7mm. It looks superficially like a huntsman spider.
S. radiatus has proved to be an effective controlling agent of the potato tuber moth in South Africa.
Selenops is the first spider known to be able to steer and glide when falling, in order to land in or on a tree, instead of falling to the ground.
Selenops spiders are able to attack prey approaching from all directions. When attacking prey from behind, they show some of the fastest turning movements documented in terrestrial legged animals.
Name
Named after the moon goddess Selene, and Greek -ops "eye", because of the moon-like form of the eyes.
Selected species
- Selenops australiensis
- Selenops aztecus Valdez-Mondragon, 2010
- Selenops galapagoensis
- Selenops lobatse
- Selenops muehlmannorum Jager & Praxaysombath, 2011
- Selenops nesophilus
- Selenops radiatus
- Selenops rosario
- Selenops submaculosus
References
- "Flying Spiders Found—and They Can Steer in Mid-Air". Archived from the original on August 20, 2015.
- Yanoviak, Stephen P.; Munk, Yonatan; Dudley, Robert (2015). "Arachnid aloft: directed aerial descent in neotropical canopy spiders". Journal of the Royal Society Interface. 12 (110): 0534. doi:10.1098/rsif.2015.0534. PMC 4614463. PMID 26289654.
- Zeng, Yu; Crews, Sarah (2018-04-01). "Biomechanics of omnidirectional strikes in flat spiders". Journal of Experimental Biology. 221 (7): jeb166512. doi:10.1242/jeb.166512. ISSN 0022-0949. PMID 29440135.
- Jager, P. & Praxaysombath, B. (2011). "Selenops muehlmannorum spec. nov. from Southern Laos (Araneae: Selenopidae)." Zootaxa 2883: 65-68.
External links
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