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| Ariosoma albimaculata Kodeeswaran, Dhas, Kumar & Lal, 2022 |
Abstract
Ariosoma albimaculata sp. nov. is described herein based on ten specimens [240–487 mm total length (TL)] collected from the deep-sea trawl landings at Colachel fishing harbour, off Kanyakumari, Arabian Sea, west coast of India. The new species is easily distinguished from all other congeners reported earlier, except its sympatric species, Ariosoma maurostigma Kodeeswaran, Mohapatra, Dhinakaran, Kumar and Lal 2022, having dark mark or streak present in the posterior-dorsal margin of eye orbit, but it readily differs from A. maurostigma with the presence of more total vertebrae (161–164 vs. 136–142 in A. maurostigma); more preanal vertebrae (66–68 vs. 47–51); occurrence of white spot or dot on just before the dorsal-fin origin (vs. absent in A. maurostigma); larger preanal length (49.7–55.7% TL vs. 44.0–48.8% TL); larger trunk length (30.4–33.3% TL vs. 23.5–30.2% TL); shorter tail length (44.6–48.2% TL vs. 47.8–54.6% TL). Further, A. albimaculata differs from its sister taxon A. maurostigma with a divergence of 8.1% and other congeners with the genetic distance of 15.0–28.8% in partial mitochondrial COI gene.
Keywords: Bathymyrinae, Arabian Sea, Systematics, New eel
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| Ariosoma albimaculata sp. nov., NBFGR/CONAALB, holotype, 487 mm TL, mature female, fresh colouration |
Ariosoma albimaculata sp. nov.
(New English name: White spotted stout conger)
Distribution. Indian Ocean: Off Kanyakumari, Arabian Sea.
Etymology. The species epithet “albimaculata” is derived from two Latin words albus = white and maculatus = spotted, denotes a white spot present on the dorsal-fin origin.
Paramasivam Kodeeswaran, Deepa Dhas, Thipramalai Thangappan Pillai Ajith Kumar and Kuldeep Kumar Lal. 2022. Description of A New Congrid Eel, Ariosoma albimaculata sp. nov. (Anguilliformes: Congridae), from the southwest coast of India, Arabian Sea. Ichthyological Research. DOI: 10.1007/s10228-022-00882-1 [06 July 2022]
