A new species of Melithaea (Anthozoa, Octocorallia, Melithaeidae) from the Oman Sea, off Oman

Kaveh Samimi-Namin; Leen P van Ofwegen; Catherine S McFadden

doi:10.3897/zookeys.623.10045

A new species of Melithaea (Anthozoa, Octocorallia, Melithaeidae) from the Oman Sea, off Oman

Zookeys. 2016 Oct 11:(623):15-29. doi: 10.3897/zookeys.623.10045. eCollection 2016.

Authors

Kaveh Samimi-Namin¹, Leen P van Ofwegen¹, Catherine S McFadden²

Affiliations

¹ Naturalis Biodiversity Center, PO Box 9517, 2300 RA Leiden, the Netherlands.
² Department of Biology, Harvey Mudd College, 1250 N. Dartmouth Ave., Claremont, CA 91711 USA.

Abstract

A new species, Melithaea davidisp. n., is described from the eastern coast of Oman, Oman Sea, in the northwestern Indian Ocean, where it differs from its congeners in lacking capstans and having predominantly spindles in the coenenchyme. A molecular phylogenetic analysis of mtMutS and 28S rDNA genes suggests that it is genetically distinct from similar species in the Red Sea. Furthermore, a species previously reported as Acabaria sp. from the Arabian Sea is now identified as Melithaea mabahissi (Hickson, 1940).

Keywords: Indian Ocean; Middle East; Persian Gulf; northwest Indian Ocean; octocorals.