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A new brooding species of brittle star (Echinodermata: Ophiuroidea) from Antarctic waters

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Abstract

A new brittle star attributable to the genus Ophiacantha is described from Antarctic waters, in the diffuse limits of the Antarctic Polar Front at Shag Rocks, South Georgia. The new species can be differentiated from its Southern Ocean congeners by the striations on the arm plates. Several adult individuals were observed brooding their juveniles, as the arms of the juveniles were seen emerging from the genital slits of the parent. The present paper reports this discovery, providing a description and illustrations of Ophiacantha wolfarntzi n. sp., a comparison of the species with its closest congeners and an identification key for Ophiacantha species reported from sub-Antarctic and Antarctic waters.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the officers and the crew of the RRS James Clark Ross (JRR144 cruise) and RV Polarstern (ANT XXVII/3 cruise) for their support and help. Special thanks to many colleagues on board and cruise leaders Katrin Linse (James Cark Ross) and Rainer Knust (Polarstern) for facilitating the work at sea. Thanks to Rachel Downey (BAS) for sorting and sampling specimens, Huw Griffiths (BAS) for data support, Dirk Steinke (University of Guelph) for providing the Barcoding service and Magdalena Biszczuk (BAS) for assistance with map figures. Thanks also for the assistance of Andrew Cabrinovic of the Natural History Museum, London for providing his time and resources to examine specimens. We are grateful to Sabine Stöhr and Timothy O’Hara and an anonymous reviewer for their constructive comments, which helped to improve the manuscript. Special thanks to Elena Zaikina for providing assistance to RML and CJS. This study was partially supported by a SynTax grant and Antarctic Science bursary to CJS.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Área de Zoología, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad de Extremadura, Badajoz, Spain

    Rafael Martín-Ledo

  2. Natural Environment Research Council, British Antarctic Survey, Cambridge, UK

    Chester J. Sands

  3. Biodiversidad y Ecología de Invertebrados Marinos, Departamento de Zoología, Facultad de Biología, Universidad de Sevilla, Sevilla, Spain

    Pablo J. López-González

Authors
  1. Rafael Martín-Ledo
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  2. Chester J. Sands
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  3. Pablo J. López-González
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rafael Martín-Ledo.

Appendix

Appendix

See Table 3.

Table 3 Key to Ophiacantha species from the Southern Ocean
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Martín-Ledo, R., Sands, C.J. & López-González, P.J. A new brooding species of brittle star (Echinodermata: Ophiuroidea) from Antarctic waters. Polar Biol 36, 115–126 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-012-1242-z

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