Looking for morphological evidence of cryptic species in Asterina Nardo, 1834 (Echinodermata: Asteroidea). The redescription of Asterina pancerii (Gasco, 1870) and the description of two new species
Violeta López-Márquez A C , Iván Acevedo A , M. Eugenia Manjón-Cabeza B , Ricardo García-Jiménez A , José Templado A and Annie Machordom A
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations
A Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales (MNCN-CSIC), José Gutiérrez Abascal 2, 28006 Madrid, Spain.
B Departamento de Biología Animal, Universidad de Málaga, Campus de Teatinos s/n, 29071 Málaga, Spain.
C Corresponding author. Email: violetalm@mncn.csic.es
Invertebrate Systematics 32(3) 505-523 https://doi.org/10.1071/IS17024
Submitted: 9 July 2016 Accepted: 9 August 2017 Published: 26 April 2018
Abstract
Three species of the genus Asterina are known to inhabit the Mediterranean Sea and the north-eastern Atlantic Ocean: Asterina gibbosa (Pennant, 1777), A. pancerii (Gasco, 1870) and A. phylactica Emson & Crump, 1979. Differentiation of these species has primarily been based only on subtle characters (some highly debatable), such as colour or size. Therefore, this study aimed to review the morphological data characterising members of the genus, to incorporate new characters that may clarify morphological analyses and to couple morphological data with molecular evidence of differentiation based on the analysis of partial sequences of the cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI) and 18S rDNA (18S) genes and two anonymous nuclear loci (AgX2 and AgX5). The different lineages and cryptic species identified from the molecular analysis were then morphologically characterised, which was challenging given the limited number of diagnostic characters. Two of the five monophyletic lineages obtained molecularly (COI divergence >4%), further supported by differences in morphological characters and reproductive behaviour, are proposed as new species: Asterina martinbarriosi, sp. nov. from the Canary Islands, Spain (eastern central Atlantic Ocean) and Asterina vicentae, sp. nov. from Tarragona, north-eastern Spain (western Mediterranean Sea).
Keywords: Asteroidea, mitochondrial DNA, morphology, nuclear DNA.
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