Actinopus Perty, 1833

Ríos-Tamayo, D. & Goloboff, P. A., 2018, Taxonomic Revision And Morphology Of The Trapdoor Spider Genus Actinopus (Mygalomorphae: Actinopodidae) In Argentina, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 2018 (419), pp. 1-84 : 11-12

Actinopus Perty, 1833

Actinopus Perty, 1833: 198 , senior synonym of Closterochilus Ausserer, 1871: 141 ; Raven, 1985: 145.

Theragretes Ausserer, 1871: 142 , Raven, 1985: 147.

Aussereria Holmberg, 1881: 170 . Simon, 1892: 80.

TYPE SPECIES: Actinopus tarsalis Perty, 1833: 198 , pl. 39, fig. 6 (holotype male, Piauí, Brasil, not located in MNHN, problably lost) ; C.L. Koch, 1842: 101, fig. 753; Simon, 1892: 80, figs. 80, 82; Lucas et al., 1978 /1979: 133, figs. 3–6; Platnick, 2014; Miglio et al., 2012: 375–379, figs. 1–12.

EMENDED DIAGNOSIS: Actinopus can be distinguished from Migidae , Missulena Walckenaer, 1805 , and Plesiolena Goloboff and Platnick, 1987 , by the presence of a rastellum on a long projection; the II and III pair of sternal sigilla short or elongate (if elongate, converging on the center of the sternum); the third patella and tibia with short cusps; the female tibia II has more spines than does tibia I; and the male palpal bulb has two tegular apophyses (a basal one and an apical one) ( Goloboff and Platnick, 1987). In accordance with the phylogenetic analysis of the genus (D. R.- T. and P.A.G., in prep.), Actinopus can also be distinguished by a very procurved fovea; the base of the spermathecae without a differentiated duct (in Missulena with elongate duct, in Plesiolena with short duct, barely differentiated); a single tooth on the male paired claws ( Missulena and Plesiolena have several teeth on the paired claws); the postlabial sigilla fused (two small sigilla, well marked on Missulena and Plesiolena ); copulatory bulb with three keels on the embolus ( Missulena and Plesiolena simple, without keels); and the male pedipalp longer than leg I (longer than in Missulena and Plesiolena ).

NOTE: In a recent paper, Wheeler et al. (2016) have published a tree where Missulena is more closely related to Atrax and Hadronyche (Hexathelidae) than to Actinopus ( Plesiolena is not included in that analysis). This makes Actinopodidae paraphyletic, and Hexathelidae polyphyletic. However, as discussed by Wheeler et al. (2016) that result is produced only when the analysis is constrained to obey the backbone of a previous phylogenomic analysis of Araneae , by Garrison et al. (2016). The tree of Garrison et al. (2016) includes many fewer taxa, and no representatives of either Actinopodidae or Hexathelidae ; thus, the way in which hexathelids and actinopdids are related in the constrained analysis of Wheeler et al. (2016) may be simply a byproduct of the constraints imposed on the relationships of the other taxa. The unconstrained analyses affected by Wheeler et al. (2016) did display Actinopodidae as a monophyletic group. For that reason, and at least until the results published by Wheeler et al. (2016) for the actinopodids are corroborated by independent evidence, we continue to compare Actinopus with Missulena and Plesiolena , as in the traditional classification.

DISTRIBUTION: All of South America with the exception of Chile.