Recognising overlooked diversity
Systematics & Species Discovery
Comparative morphology, diagnostic characters, taxonomic revision and integrative species delimitation.
Bharata Mata College (Autonomous), Kochi
ORiGIN Lab
Organismal Research in Genomics, Integrative Systematics and Natural History
Tracing biodiversity from landscape to lineage.
ORiGIN Lab investigates how species arise, diversify and persist using field biology, morphology, molecular data, museum collections and evolutionary analysis.
Organisms • Genomes • Landscapes
Understanding diversity across space and time
The laboratory integrates field research, natural history, morphology, systematics, molecular phylogenetics, phylogenomics and museum collections.
About ORiGIN LabResearch programme
Four connected research themes
Reconstructing evolutionary history
Phylogenetics & Phylogenomics
Evolutionary relationships inferred using multilocus and genome-scale data, with explicit attention to uncertainty and concordance.
Connecting lineages and landscapes
Historical Biogeography
Testing how vicariance, dispersal, climate and geological history shaped present-day organismal distributions.
Evidence from specimens and deep time
Collections, Fossils & Imaging
Connecting modern biodiversity with museum specimens, fossil inclusions, microscopy and non-destructive imaging.
TerraEvo framework
From landscape to lineage
Earth history, geographic barriers, habitat structure and dispersal limitation influence how lineages originate, diversify and persist.
How does geography structure evolutionary diversity?
How can overlooked species be recognised?
What can low-dispersal arthropods reveal about deep time?
Research process
Evidence moves from field to synthesis
Field sampling
Habitat, locality and specimen documentation.
Morphology & imaging
Microscopy, diagnostic structures and comparative characters.
Molecular data
DNA barcodes, multilocus datasets and genomic evidence.
Evolutionary analysis
Phylogeny, dating, concordance and biogeographic inference.
Open outputs
Publications, datasets, collections and conservation evidence.
Selected programmes
Featured projects
Integrative Revision of Western Ghats Tyrannochthoniini
An integrative taxonomic and biogeographic revision combining morphology, molecular evidence and evolutionary analyses to resolve poorly known Western Ghats pseudoscorpion diversity.
Multi-lineage UCE Phylogenomics in the Western Ghats
A comparative framework designed to test whether different low-dispersal pseudoscorpion lineages preserve concordant geographic and evolutionary signals.
Comparative Tyrannochthonius Systematics
Comparative study of North American and East Asian lineages using museum collections, morphology, molecular evidence and phylogenomic approaches.
Western Ghats Tarantula Conservation
Field-based research supporting distributional baselines, habitat documentation and conservation assessment for threatened and poorly known Western Ghats tarantulas.
Research outputs
Selected publications
2026
A new species of Mundochthonius Chamberlin, 1929 from Tsushima Island, Japan with notes on cryptic diversity and biogeography of the Japanese Archipelago
Jeong K-H, Oh J, Shida R, Johnson J, Harms D & Kim S
Evolutionary Systematics 10(2): 263–274
DOI: 10.3897/evolsyst.10.199765
2024
A new species of Ditha from the Western Ghats of India, with an identification key for the genus
Jeong K-H, Harms D & Johnson J
Zoosystematics and Evolution 100(1): 1–8
DOI: 10.3897/zse.100.110020
2023
First record of the pseudoscorpion tribe Tyrannochthoniini from mid-Cretaceous Burmese amber of northern Myanmar
Johnson J, Loria SF, Kotthoff U, Hammel JU, Joseph MM & Harms D
Cretaceous Research 144: 105459
DOI: 10.1016/j.cretres.2022.105459
2022
Biogeographical and diversification analyses of Indian pseudoscorpions reveal the Western Ghats as museums of ancient biodiversity
Johnson J, Loria SF, Joseph MM & Harms D
Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 175: 107495
DOI: 10.1016/j.ympev.2022.107495
JJ
Principal investigator
Dr. Jithin Johnson, FLS
Assistant Professor · Department of Zoology, Bharata Mata College (Autonomous)
Jithin is an evolutionary biologist and arachnologist working on pseudoscorpion systematics, Western Ghats biogeography, phylogenomics, integrative taxonomy, fossil arachnids and invertebrate conservation.
- Pseudoscorpion systematics
- Historical biogeography
- Phylogenomics
- Integrative taxonomy
- Fossil arachnids
- Invertebrate conservation
Updates and coverage
Latest news & media
Institutional News
18 February 2026
Elected Fellow of the Linnean Society of London
Bharata Mata College
The college announced Dr. Jithin Johnson’s election as a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London.
Institutional News
30 January 2026
Grant support for an international workshop on soil arachnids
Bharata Mata College
Institutional announcement of grant support for an international workshop on evolutionary systematics of soil arachnids.
Conference
2026
Arachnid Systematics of the Oriental and Indo-Pacific Regions
23rd International Congress of Arachnology
A symposium on integrative taxonomy, molecular systematics, phylogenomics and conservation coordinated by Dr. Jithin Johnson and Dr. Stephanie F. Loria.
Collaboration
Work with ORiGIN Lab
Expressions of interest are welcome from students, researchers, museums and institutions working in organismal biology, systematics, genomics and natural history.