Tosanoidesaphrodite, a new species from mesophotic coral ecosystems of St. Paul's Rocks, Mid Atlantic Ridge (Perciformes, Serranidae, Anthiadinae).

Hudson T Pinheiro,Luiz A Rocha,Claudia Rocha

doi:10.3897/zookeys.786.27382

Abstract

During a recent expedition to St. Paul’s Rocks, Atlantic Ocean, a distinctive and previously unknown species of Anthiadinae was collected at a depth of 120 m. A genetic analysis indicated the undescribed species is a member of the genus Tosanoides, which was only known to occur in the Pacific Ocean. This new taxon is distinguishable from all other Tosanoides species by the following combination of characters: soft dorsal fin rays 15–16; anal fin rays 9; ventral scale rows 9–10; last dorsal spine the longest (instead first through fourth). Here Tosanoidesaphroditesp. n. is described and illustrated, only known from St. Paul’s Rocks.

Highlights

The group commonly known as anthias fishes are classified within the serranid subfamily Anthiadinae Poey, 1861 (van der Laan et al 2014), historically known as “Anthiinae”
Differences in counts, body proportions, morphology of dorsal and caudal soft rays, and distribution made us believe that T. aphrodite constituted a new genus
Preliminary genetic analysis based on the COI gene placed T. aphrodite between two pairs of Tosanoides species

Summary

Introduction

The group commonly known as anthias fishes are classified within the serranid subfamily Anthiadinae Poey, 1861 (van der Laan et al 2014), historically known as “Anthiinae” (but see Carvalho-Filho et al 2016; Pyle et al 2016; Anderson et al 2017; Eschmeyer and Fong 2018). In their review of the Atlantic and Eastern Pacific Anthiadine fishes, Anderson and Heemstra (2012) recognized 15 genera and 37 species, describing two Copyright Hudson T. One species of Odontanthias was described from St. Paul’s Rocks (Carvalho-Filho et al 2016), an archipelago of small islets located around 940 km from Northeastern Brazil, in the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (Viana et al 2009). Paul’s Rocks harbors one of the highest levels of endemism for reef fishes among Atlantic oceanic islands (Floeter et al 2008, Pinheiro et al 2018), even sheltering a genetic isolated population of a widespread species of Anthiadinae (Anderson et al 2017)

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