Nature, fortunately, has not yet revealed all its wonders to us, and the animal kingdom remains largely unknown. Hundreds of species new to science are classified every year — mostly invertebrates and small vertebrates, such as amphibians, reptiles or small mammals. It is, however, extremely rare for a new large mammal to be discovered, even rarer when we are talking about primates. And yet that is precisely what has happened in China.

The new Jedi gibbon

The new species, identified by a Chinese, British and American research team, lives perched in the trees growing in the forests of the Gaoligong Mountains, in the south-western Chinese province of Yunnan, on the border with northern Myanmar. The primate has been named the Skywalker gibbon (Hoolock Skywalker), both in reference to the Chinese characters that make up its scientific name tianxing, meaning "movements of heaven", and because the researchers who classified it have a soft spot for the Star Wars film saga. The name is also particularly apt given that these animals spend virtually their entire lives suspended in the air, leaping from tree to tree and rarely coming down to the ground.

The study

The new primate was described in the study "Description of a new species of Hoolock gibbon (Primates: Hylobatidae) based on integrative taxonomy", published in the American Journal of Primatology. The animal had been studied for some time, but only new research, conducted by Fan Pengfei of Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, confirmed that it belongs to a new species within the hoolock gibbon genus, which already includes the western hoolock gibbon (Hoolock hoolock) and the eastern hoolock gibbon (H. leuconedys). The confirmation came through analysing DNA samples from the gibbons and comparing the colour of their coats.

"Given away" by their eyebrows and their song

All gibbons of the hoolock genus have white eyebrows, and some have white beards, but the markings of the Chinese primates appeared to differ. The distinctive vocalisations that gibbons use to communicate with one another and to mark their territory also seemed unusual to the researchers, who subsequently carried out the genetic tests that confirmed their suspicions.

Just discovered and already endangered

Unfortunately, the survival of the Skywalker gibbon is already threatened, like many other species of ape in southern China and South-East Asia, due to habitat loss and hunting. "We have asked the Iucn to immediately grant endangered status to the Skywalker hoolock gibbon," said one of the study's authors, Samuel Turvey, of the Zoological Society of London (Zsl). "Better conservation of the Gaoligong Mountains is essential to ensure we have time to fully understand this new species before it is too late." Despite the lack of data — given that the gibbons live in high-altitude forests that are not particularly easy to access — the researchers estimate that there are around 200 Skywalker gibbons living across China and Myanmar.