Frestiwater Animal Diversity Assessment

• Main Authors: Thomas Jankowski, Allen G. Collins, Richard Campbell, Springer Science+business Media B. V, C. Lévêque, H. Segers, T. Jankowski {m, A. G. Collins, R. Campbell
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Antarc*; Antarctica
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.501.7718; http://si-pddr.si.edu/dspace/bitstream/10088/6248/1/Jankowsk_etal_Hyd2008.pdf

Abstract Global diversity of inland water cnidari-ans is low, containing <40 species belonging to phylogenetically distinct groups representing inde-pendent invasion events: the common and cosmopolitan hydras (12-15 species); the sporadi-cally occurring freshwater medusae (6-16 sp.); the Cordylophorinae (2 sp.); the parasitic Polypodium (1 sp.); the medusae occurring in saline lakes (4 sp.). Freshwater cnidarians inhabit nearly all types of freshwater on all continents (except Antarctica), but only a few species have cosmopolitan distributions. Due to uncertainty in species knowledge, ñne scale regions of endemicity are not yet clear.