LAUSR

Objectives Annually, 1.2 million humans are stung by scorpions and severely affected by their venom. Some of the scorpion species of medical importance have a similar morphology to species with low toxicity. To establish diagnostic tools for surveying scorpions, the current study was conducted to generate three mitochondrial markers, Cytochrome Oxidase I (COI gene), 12S rDNA and 16S rDNA for six species of medically important Iranian scorpions: Androctonus crassicauda , Hottentotta saulcyi , Mesobuthus caucasicus , M. eupeus , Odontobuthus doriae , and Scorpio maurus . Results Phylogenetic analyses of the obtained sequences corroborated the morphological identification. For the first time, 12S rDNA sequences are reported from Androctonus crassicauda, Hottentotta saulcyi , Mesobuthus caucasicus and M. eupeus and also the 16S rDNA sequence from Hottentotta saulcyi . We conclude that the mitochondrial markers are useful for species determination among these medically important species of scorpions.