A new species of Novastoa Finlay, 1926 (Mollusca: Gastropoda: Vermetidae) from coral reefs of the Pacific Ocean

  • Stefano Schiaparelli Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra dell’Ambiente e della Vita (DISTAV), Università di Genova, C.so Europa 26, 16132 Genova, Italy and Museo Nazionale Dell’Antartide (MNA), Viale Benedetto XV N° 5, 16132 Genova
  • Rüdiger Bieler Integrative Research Center, Field Museum of Natural History, 1400 Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois 60605
  • Rosemary E. Golding Integrative Research Center, Field Museum of Natural History, 1400 Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois 60605
  • Timothy A. Rawlings Department of Biology, Cape Breton University, 1250 Grand Lake Road, Sydney, Nova Scotia B1P 6L2
  • Timothy M. Collins Department of Biological Sciences, Florida International University, 11200 SW 8th St., Miami, Florida 33199
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5852/ejt.2017.323
Keywords: Vermetidae, Novastoa rapaitiensis sp. nov., Pacific Ocean, taxonomy, morphology

Abstract

A new species of vermetid gastropod belonging to the genus Novastoa Finlay, 1926, N. rapaitiensis sp. nov., is described from French Polynesia and the Great Barrier Reef, based on morpho-anatomical and molecular data, increasing the recognized extant diversity of this genus from five to six species. The new species is characterized by the largest operculum in the genus to date, with a conspicuous spindle-shaped mammilla that readily distinguishes this species from its congeners. Based on available data, members of the studied populations of N. rapaitiensis sp. nov. are interpreted as a single species, although slight morphological and color differences exist between localities separated by up to 7000 km. The larval development of N. rapaitiensis sp. nov. is inferred to be direct, raising new questions about genetic connectivity and dispersal trajectories across a vast geographic range. Additional molecular data may prove helpful in refining our current knowledge on the morphological variability within this species and verifying the degree of cryptic diversity in this genus.

References

Bieler R. & Petit R.E. 2011. Catalogue of the Recent and fossil “worm-snail” taxa of the families Vermetidae, Siliquariidae, and Turritellidae (Mollusca: Caenogastropoda). Zootaxa 2948: 1–103.

Calvo M., Templado J., Oliverio M. & Machordom A. 2009. Hidden Mediterranean biodiversity: Molecular evidence for a cryptic species complex within the reef building vermetid gastropod Dendropoma petraeum (Mollusca: Caenogastropoda). Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 96: 898–912. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1095-8312.2008.01167.x

Calvo M., Alda F., Oliverio M., Templado J. & Machordom. A. 2015. Surviving the Messinian salinity crisis? Divergence patterns in the genus Dendropoma (Gastropoda: Vermetidae) in the Mediterranean Sea. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 91: 17–26. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ympev.2015.05.004

Englund R.A. 2003. Report for the 2002 Pacific Biological Survey, Bishop Museum Austral Islands, French Polynesia expedition to Raivavae and Rapa Iti. Pacific Biological Survey, Constribution 2003- 004: 1–30.

Faucci A. 2007. The Influence of Larval Dispersal Potential on Speciation, Phylogeography, and Genetic Population Structure in two Pacific Marine Snail Groups. PhD. Dissertation. University of Hawai’i, USA.

Golding R.E., Bieler R., Rawlings T. & Collins T.M. 2014. Deconstructing Dendropoma: a systematic revision of a world-wide snail group, with descriptions of new genera (Caenogastropoda: Vermetidae). Malacologia 57: 1–97. https://doi.org/10.4002/040.057.0103

Lozouet P., Cosel R. von, Héros V., Le Goff A., Maestrati P., Menou J.-L., Schiaparelli S. & TröndléJ. 2004. L’atelier RAPA 2002 (Polynésie française). Xenophora 107: 17–30.

Lozouet P., Cosel R. von, Héros V., Le Goff A., Maestrati P., Menou J.-L., Schiaparelli S. & TröndléJ. 2005. Biodiversity gradient in the Pacific: first results of RAPA 2002 (French Polynesia). In: Richard G. (ed.) Les Mollusques dans la Recherche Actuelle. Actes du IIIe Congrès international des Sociétés européennes de Malacologie (La Rochelle, 24–27 Jun. 2003): 93–99.

Osca D., Templado J. & Zardoya R. 2015. Caenogastropod mitogenomics. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 93: 118–128. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ympev.2015.07.011

Rawlings T., MacInnis M., Bieler R., Boore J. & Collins T. 2010. Sessile snails, dynamic genomes: gene rearrangements within the mitochondrial genome of a family of caenogastropod molluscs. BMC Genomics 11: e440. https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2164-11-440

Schiaparelli S., Albertelli G. & Cattaneo-Vietti R. 2006. Phenotypic plasticity of Vermetidae suspension feeding: a potential bias in their use as biological sea-level indicators. Marine Ecology 27 (1): 44–53. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1439-0485.2006.00076.x

Templado J., Richter A. & Calvo M. 2016. Reef building Mediterranean vermetid gastropods: disentangling the Dendropoma petraeum species complex. Mediterranean Marine Science 17: 13–31. https://doi.org/10.12681/mms.1333

Published
2017-05-29
How to Cite
Schiaparelli, S., Bieler, R., Golding, R. E., Rawlings, T. A., & Collins, T. M. (2017). A new species of Novastoa Finlay, 1926 (Mollusca: Gastropoda: Vermetidae) from coral reefs of the Pacific Ocean. European Journal of Taxonomy, (323). https://doi.org/10.5852/ejt.2017.323
Issue
No. 323 (2017): A new species of Novastoa Finlay, 1926 (Mollusca: Gastropoda: Vermetidae) from coral reefs of the Pacific Ocean
Section
Zoology
Copyright (c) 2017 Stefano Schiaparelli, Rüdiger Bieler, Rosemary E. Golding, Timothy A. Rawlings, Timothy M. Collins

Creative Commons Copyright Notices

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

  1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0) that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
  2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
  3. Authors are NOT ALLOWED TO post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to taxonomic issues.