Faculty of Biology UGM in collaboration with Museum Zoologicum Bogoriense (MZB), Research Center for Biology – Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), Amphibian and Reptile Diversity Research Center (ARDRC), the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA), IPB, UB, and ITB successfully identified a new frog species native to Indonesia. The frog, named Microhyla gadjahmadai, is identified by a master student of the Faculty of Biology, Vestidhia Y. Atmaja.
The new species are the 407th frog found to be native to Indonesia. The distribution of this frog including Bengkulu, Jambi, Lampung, and South Sumatra at an altitude of 700 to 1600, with habitats covering river basins, rice fields, and community plantations. The application of molecular genetic identification using 12s and 16s sequence fragments of mitochondrial RNA and bioinformatics helped determine that Microhyla gadjahmadai belongs to a new species.
This discovery proves the richness of Indonesia’s biodiversity and should motivate more researchers to discover new species.
