Ecologica Montenegrina 20: 168-193 (2019) This journal is available online at: www.biotaxa.org/em An overview on the subterranean fauna from Central Asia VASILE DECU1†, CHRISTIAN JUBERTHIE2*, SANDA IEPURE1,3, 4, VICTOR GHEORGHIU1 & GEORGE NAZAREANU5 1 Institut de Spéologie Emil Racovitza, Calea 13 September, 13, R0 13050711 Bucuresti, Rumania 2 Encyclopédie Biospéologique, Edition. 1 Impasse Saint-Jacques, 09190 Saint-Lizier, France 3Cavanilles Institute of Biodiversity and Evolutionary Biology, University of Valencia, José Beltrán 15 Martínez, 2, 46980 Paterna, Valencia, Spain. E-mail:
[email protected] 4University of Gdańsk, Faculty of Biology, Department of Genetics and Biosystematics, Wita Stwoswa 59, 80-308 Gdańsk, Poland 5Muzeul national de Istorie naturala « Grigore Antipa » Sos, Kiseleff 1, Bucharest, Rumania E-mail:
[email protected] *Corresponding author: E-mail:
[email protected] Received 9 December 2018 │ Accepted by V. Pešić: 8 March 2019 │ Published online 21 March 2019. Abstract Survey of the aquatic subterranean fauna from caves, springs, interstitial habitat, wells in deserts, artificial tunnels (Khanas) of five countries of the former URSS (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tadjikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan) located far east the Caspian Sea. The cave fauna present some originalities: - the rich fauna of foraminiferida in the wells of the Kara-Kum desert (Turkmenistan); - the cave fish Paracobitis starostini from the Provull gypsum Cave (Turkmenistan); - the presence of a rich stygobitic fauna in the wells of the Kyzyl-Kum desert (Uzbekistan); - the rich stygobitic fauna from the hyporheic of streams and wells around the tectonic Issyk-Kul Lake (Kyrgyzstan); - the eastern limit of the European genus Niphargus from the sub-lacustrin springs on the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea (Kazakhstan); - the presence of cave fauna of marine origin.