Redescription and establishment of a holotype and three paratypes for the species Hemimycale mediterranea sp. nov.

Introduction

In an earlier version of this article published on 7 March 2017, Uriz, Garate & Agell (2017) reassessed the taxonomy of the genus Hemimycale Burton, 1934 (Porifera: Poecilosclerida), and describe a new species of Hemimycale, which is morphologically cryptic with the Atlanto-Mediterranean Hemimycale columella. The new species, named Hemimycale mediterranea, was extensively described in the above mentioned paper by Uriz, Garate & Agell (2017) (LSID: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:69255188-5A55-4D5C-9DC2-43E2B6CF6997) based on morphological and molecular characters, but the authors did not include a designation of the holotype specimen of Hemimycale mediterranea. Therefore, this nomenclatural act cannot be considered as published under International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) regulations, and the species name is not available from the earlier version of this work.

In the present work, we designate a holotype and three paratypes and indicate the type locality for the new species. Similarly, this work has been registered in ZooBank (see below) and now fulfills the requirements of the ICZN for a holotype designation.

Material and Methods

The electronic version of this article in, Portable Document Format (PDF), will represent a published work according to the ICZN. Hence, the holotype and paratype designation contained in the electronic version is effectively published under the ICZN code from the electronic edition alone. This published work has been registered in ZooBank, the online registration system for the ICZN. The ZooBank LSID (Life Science Identifier) can be resolved and the associated information viewed through any standard web browser by appending the LSID to the prefix “http://zoobank.org/”. The LSID for this publication is: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:E2F883E3-FDAD-4F2A-A82C-28AF03C55C8C.

The online version of this work is archived and available from the following digital repositories: PeerJ.

Species Systematics

Taxonomic assessment

The name Hemimycale mediterranea published in an earlier version of this article on 7 March 2017, is not available from the earlier version of this work because it did not include a designation of the holotype.

Type material

CRBA-56057 is the sponge specimen herein designated as holotype (see Remarks, below). CRBA-56058-60 are three specimens here designated as paratypes. The holotype and the paratypes have been deposited at the Centre de Recursos de Biodiversitat Animal (Faculty de Biology), University of Barcelona, Spain.

Type locality

The locality from which the holotype was collected was “Roca del Moro” (41.7074°N; 2.91172°E) (Muladera), in Tossa de Mar, at 15 m of depth.

Remarks

A complete description of the new species Hemimycale mediterranea is provided by Uriz, Garate & Agell (2017), and we reference that publication in accordance with Article 13.1.2 of the ICZN Code. However, no holotype was designated for the new species in the previous publication. In order to avoid potential future issues with the taxonomic status of H. mediterranea, the specimens here described are herein designated as the species holotype (CRBA-56057) and paratypes (CRBA.56058, CRBA.56059, CRBA.56060), ZooBank LSID: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:E2F883E3-FDAD-4F2A-A82C-28AF03C55C8C.

Description

Species: H. mediterranea sp. nov.

GenBank accession Numbers of sequences (Table 1).

Description: thick encrusting sponges with aerolate inhaling areas up to 3 mm in diameter, surrounded by an up to 1.5–2 mm high rim that in some cases barely surpasses the sponge surface (Fig. 1). Thousands of calcareous spherules, 1 µm in diameter, formed by intracellular calcifying bacteria, are spread through the sponge mesohyl and especially accumulated at the sponge periphery (Uriz et al., 2012; Garate et al., 2017).

Ectosome: firmly attached to the choanosome.

Color: flesh to clear brownish externally, with whitish tinges depending on calcibacteria accumulation at the surface that was sometimes partially covered by an epibiotic (reddish or pinkish) cyanobacteria.

Spicules (Table 2, Fig. 2): smooth, uniform in size, straight, anysostrongyles, 200–296 × 3–4 µm in size. Styles completely absent.

Skeletal arrangement: plumose undulating bundles of anysostrongyles together with spread spicules. A palisade of vertical anysotrongyles forms the rim around the inhaling areas.

Known distribution: northwestern Mediterranean, central Mediterranean, Adriatic, eastern Mediterranean (Spain: Cap De Creus, Tossa, Blanes, Arenys, South Italy: Croatia, Tremiti, Turkey, Greece), between 3 and 17 m deep.

Biology: the species has an annual life span with maximum growth rates in summer (M Uriz, L Garate & G Agell, 2012, unpublished data). Larval release occurs at the end of September and beginning of October (Pérez-Porro, González & Uriz, 2012).