Josefa Celsa Señaris

Josefa Celsa Señaris (born 2 November 1965) is a Venezuelan herpetologist. She has published information about frogs and she has identified new genera and species. Señaris is the director of the La Salle Foundation's Natural History Museum (Spanish: Museo de historia natural La Salle - MhnLS) in Caracas.

Life Señaris was born in 1965 and she obtained a degree in biology at the Central University of Venezuela and her doctorate in 2001 at the University of Santiago de Compostela in Spain.

She is interested in the fauna of Venezuela, in particular the Guayana Region where table-top mountains called tepuis provide habitats for endemic plant and animal species: some amphibians are known only from a single tepuy. From a geological point of view, the tepuis have been isolated for approximately 120 million years, and it has been suggested that the tepuy habitats are a "lost world" that could support relictual populations. However, Señaris's work suggests that in a zoological context tepuis are not as isolated as originally believed, and that some of their species are neoendemics rather than paleoendemics. For example, an endemic group of tree frogs, Tepuihyla, have diverged after the tepuis were formed, that is, speciation followed colonization from the lowlands.

Señaris became the director in 2004 of the La Salle Foundation's Natural History Museum (Spanish: Museo de historia natural La Salle - MhnLS) in Caracas.

Honours Eponyms In recognition of her "contributions to the knowledge of centrolenid diversity and morphology" she has had a genus of glass frog, Celsiella, named after her nickname which is Celsi.

Legacy She has described a number of taxa, in particular amphibians but also a few reptiles.

Genera

Metaphryniscus Señaris, Ayarzagüena & Gorzula, 1994 Tepuihyla Ayarzagüena, Señaris & Gorzula, 1993

Species

Arthrosaura testigensis Gorzula & Señaris, 1999 Celsiella vozmedianoi Ayarzagüena & Señaris, 1997 Cercosaura nigroventris Gorzula & Señaris, 1999 Hyalinobatrachium guairarepanense Señaris, 2001 Hyalinobatrachium mondolfii Señaris & Ayarzagüena, 2001 Hypsiboas jimenezi Señaris & Ayarzagüena, 2006 Hypsiboas rhythmicus Señaris & Ayarzagüena, 2002 Metaphryniscus sosai Señaris, Ayarzagüena & Gorzula, 1994 Myersiohyla aromatica Ayarzagüena & Señaris, 1994 Myersiohyla inparquesi Ayarzagüena & Señaris, 1994 Oreophrynella cryptica Señaris, 1995 The pebble toad — Oreophrynella nigra — has been observed to roll itself into a ball (pebble) and to throw itself down inclines to avoid tarantula spiders. Oreophrynella nigra Señaris, Ayarzagüena & Gorzula, 1994 Oreophrynella vasquezi Señaris, Ayarzagüena & Gorzula, 1994 Oreophrynella weiassipuensis Señaris, Nascimento & Villarreal, 2005 Riolama uzzelli Molina & Señaris, 2003 Stefania oculosa Señaris, Ayarzagüena & Gorzula, 1997 Stefania percristata Señaris, Ayarzagüena & Gorzula, 1997 Stefania riveroi Señaris, Ayarzagüena & Gorzula, 1997 Stefania satelles Señaris, Ayarzagüena & Gorzula, 1997 Stefania schuberti Señaris, Ayarzagüena & Gorzula, 1997 Tepuihyla aecii Ayarzagüena, Señaris & Gorzula, 1993 Tepuihyla edelcae Ayarzagüena, Señaris & Gorzula, 1993 Tepuihyla galani Ayarzagüena, Señaris & Gorzula, 1993 Tepuihyla luteolabris Ayarzagüena, Señaris & Gorzula, 1993 Tepuihyla rimarum Ayarzagüena, Señaris & Gorzula, 1993 Vitreorana castroviejoi Ayarzagüena & Señaris, 1997