Scientists are claiming they have discovered a new species of
monkey living in the remote forests of the Democratic Republic
of Congo -- an animal well-known to local hunters but until now,
unknown to the outside world. In a paper published Wednesday in
the open-access journal Plos One, the scientists describe the
new species that they call Cercopithecus Lomamiensis, known
locally as the Lesula, whose home is deep in central DR Congo's
Lomami forest basin. The scientists say it is only the second
discovery of a monkey species in 28 years. In an age where so
much of the earth's surface has been photographed, digitized,
and placed on a searchable map on the web discoveries like this
one by a group of American scientists this seem a throwback to
another time. "We never expected to find a new species there,"
says John Hart, the lead scientist of the project, "but the
Lomami basin is a very large block that has had very little
exploration by biologists." Hart says that the rigorous
scientific process to determine