Microcharon quilli, a new asellote isopod crustacean from interstitial spaces in shallow coralline sands off St. Eustatius, Caribbean Netherlands

Abstract

The genus Microcharon is known in the Caribbean from the widely separated islands of Bonaire and Cuba, occurring in brackish and freshwater subterranean environments. Here we describe a new species from reef sands off St. Eustatius, eastern Caribbean. Morphological differences are small between the eleven other marine or coastal groundwater Microcharon species that are known worldwide, and comparisons do not show a biogeographic pattern of sequential dispersion.

Editorial: biodiversity of Caribbean coral reefs (with a focus on the Dutch Caribbean)

“…These concerned new species (e.g., Montano et al 2017b;Vonk and Lau 2017), new species records for the Atlantic (Montano et al 2017a; Van der Loos and Prud'homme van Reine 2017), new host records in interspecific associations (García-Hernández et al 2016;Hoeksema et al 2017b;Ivanenko et al 2017;Montano et al 2017a, b), new records on interspecific competition , and new records concerning the island's flora and fauna (Hewitt 2015;Hewitt et al 2016 (Hoeksema and Van der Meij 2013), and, in particular, which Caribbean marine ecoregions and taxa have been covered and investigated thus far. Such information may serve as a basis to generate ideas for future research.…”