Paraleptopentacta tergestina Mezali, Thandar & Khodja, 2020, n. comb.

• Main Authors: Mezali, Karim, Thandar, Ahmed S., Khodja, Ihcene
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: unknown
• Published: 2020
• Subjects: Biodiversity; Taxonomy; Animalia; Echinodermata; Holothuroidea; Dendrochirotida; Cucumariidae; Paraleptopentacta; Paraleptopentacta tergestina; North West Atlantic
• Online Access: https://zenodo.org/record/4537687; https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4537687

Paraleptopentacta tergestina n. comb. (Sars, 1859) Figures 1–3 Cucumaria tergestina Sars, 1859: 127; Koehler, 1921: 158–160. Trachythyone tergestina Tortonese, 1965: 83–85. Leptopentacta tergestina Panning, 1966: 62 (passim). Remarks. Paraleptopentacta (n. gen.) tergestina n. comb. is a cucumariid sea cucumber, a fairly well known Mediterranean species. Unlike its sister species P. elongata, which has spread into the North-West Atlantic, P. tergestina n. comb. is restricted to the Mediterranean sea (Tortonese 1965), being reported from France (Koehler 1921), Italy (Tortonese 1965; 1977; Milisenda et al. 2017), the Malta Islands (Tanti & Schembri 2006), the Aegean Sea (Voultsiadou et al. 2011), the Adriatic Sea (Petovic 2011) and the Marmara Sea (Turkey) (Öztoprak et al. 2014). It is often caught by trawlers as a bycatch, frequenting muddy, detrital waters and Posidonia and Caulerpa bottoms. The specimens here studied correspond well with the description of the species by Koehler (1921) and require no further comment. Material examined. LPVCMRMS2020.101, Mostaganem, Algeria, 36º 6.38374’N, 0º 8.34821’E, 60 m, March 2020, 5 spec. Description. Contracted individuals 20-50 mm in length and 10-15 mm in breadth. Body somewhat pentagonal, curved, with a broad mid-body and narrower posterior end. Tegument rigid, smooth, dark brown, interradial areas devoid of pedicels (Figure 2A). Pedicels light brown, rigid, non-retractable, in five double rows arranged in a zigzag fashion, elongated, slender in living specimen and short, thorn-shaped in preserved individuals. Tentacles 10, dendritic, ventral two reduced, white, with brown spots (Figure 2B). Each tentacle consists of a central trunk from which lateral branches emerge, giving rise to terminal papillate branches. Ossicles. Ossicles from the anterior end (Figure 3A), dorsal surface (Figure 3B), ventral surface (Figure 3C), anal region (Figure 3D) and podia (Figure 3E) appear identical, without any noticeable differences. They include an external layer of small baskets ...