Morphological description and DNA barcodes of shallow-water Tetractinellida (Porifera: Demospongiae) from Bocas del Toro, Panama, with description of a new species

Abstract

Tetractinellida Marshall 1876 [Borchiellini et al. 2004] comprises the Orders Spirophorida and Astrophorida. A surveyof their diversity in the Bocas del Toro archipelago (Panama) was conducted. A total of ten species of Tetractinellidawere encountered: Cinachyrella alloclada, Cinachyrella apion, Cinachyrella kuekenthali, Ecionemia megastylifera,Stelletta fibrosa, Stelletta sp., Stryphnus raratriaenus sp. nov., Erylus formosus, Geodia gibberosa and Geodiapapyracea. Five of these species are new to the Atlantic sponge fauna of Panama, one of which is new to science.Stryphnus raratriaenus sp. nov. is very similar to Caribbean Asteropus species but it possesses triaenes. It is the firstspecies of this genus in the Caribbean. The description of Ecionemia megastylifera Wintermann–Kilian & Kilian, 1984 ishere revised and the species fully redescribed. A cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI) gene partial fragment and/or a 28S ribosomal gene partial fragment (C1–D2 domains) were sequenced for some of the species collected.

Taxonomy, biogeography and DNA barcodes ofGeodiaspecies (Porifera, Demospongiae, Tetractinellida) in the Atlantic boreo-arctic region

“…Rosette diameter and hilum size were very similar in all boreo‐arctic Geodia species. It is, however, interesting to note that some species have smooth rosettes while others have warty rosettes, as observed previously in the Caribbean Geodia papyracea and Geodia tumulosa Bowerbank, 1872b (Cárdenas et al ., ). We further note that all the species examined so far with SEM from the two sister clades Depressiogeodia p ( G. barretti , G. hentscheli ) and Cydonium p ( G. macandrewii , G. papyracea ) have warty rosettes, whereas the more basally branched G. tumulosa , G. atlantica , G. phlegraei , and G. parva have smooth rosettes.…”

“…SEM spicule figures usually focus on the microscleres as the megascleres are often visible on the thick sections presented here, and were already accurately represented by Koltun (). In this study, we have also investigated sterraster characters that may potentially be relevant for Geodia species discrimination (da Silva, ; Cárdenas et al ., ): sterraster thickness, hilum diameter, rosette diameter, and morphology and number of the rosette rays.…”

“…). G. macandrewii shares the possession of identical cribriporal oscules and pores with G. cydonium and G. conchilega ; G. papyracea , by contrast, has uniporal oscules (Cárdenas et al ., ). We could nonetheless suggest that the association of cribriporal oscules and oscules could be an autapomorphy of the clade, and that the cribriporal oscules were later modified and lost in G. papyracea .…”

Diversity of sponge mitochondrial introns revealed by cox 1sequences of Tetillidae

“…Indeed, two of the discovered introns are located within the reverse primer that has been recommended for the amplification of the barcoding region of the cox 1 gene in sponges [34]. As a case in point, Cárdenas et al [35] failed to amplify the cox 1 sequence of C. alloclada using those primers, whereas we successfully amplified this species using different primers. This suggests that "standard" barcoding primers might not be adapted for the sponge and cnidarian species that share introns 714 and 870.…”

Disrupted spiculogenesis in deep‐water Geodiidae (Porifera, Demospongiae) growing in shallow waters

“…For example, the tropical shallow Erylus bahamiensis Pulitzer ‐ Finali 1989 and the deeper Erylus formosus Sollas 1886 only differ on the basis of the absence of large asters (in E. bahamiensis ); for this reason, these species were recently synonymized (Cárdenas et al. ). Another example involves Erylus discophorus ( Schmidt 1862), Erylus deficiens Topsent 1927 and Erylus sp.…”