The genus Igernella (Demospongiae: Dendroceratida) with description of a new species from the central Atlantic
Uriz, M.-J.; Maldonado, M. (1996). The genus Igernella (Demospongiae: Dendroceratida) with description of a new species from the central Atlantic. Bull. Kon. Belg. Inst. Natuurwet. Biologie 66(Suppl.): 153-163
In: Bulletin van het Koninklijk Belgisch Instituut voor Natuurwetenschappen. Biologie = Bulletin de l'Institut Royal des Sciences Naturelles de Belgique. Biologie. Koninklijk Belgisch Instituut voor Natuurwetenschappen: Bruxelles. ISSN 0374-6429
Also appears in:
Willenz, Ph. (1996). Recent advances in sponge biodiversity inventory and documentation: Proceedings of the 10th Workshop on Atlanto-Mediterranean Sponge Taxonomy, Brussels, April 25-30, 1995. Bulletin van het Koninklijk Belgisch Instituut voor Natuurwetenschappen. Biologie = Bulletin de l'Institut Royal des Sciences Naturelles de Belgique. Biologie, 66(Suppl.). Koninklijk Belgisch Instituut voor Natuurwetenschappen: Brussel. 242 pp., more
Classification > Taxonomy Taxa > Species > New taxa > New species Darwinellidae Merejkowsky, 1879 [WoRMS]; Demospongiae [WoRMS]; Dendroceratida [WoRMS]; Igernella Topsent, 1905 [WoRMS] A, Central Atlantic [Marine Regions] Marine/Coastal
The genus Igernella Topsent, 1905 includes those dendroceratid sponges characterised by an irregularly reticulate skeleton arising from a spongin plate and the presence of diactinal, triactinal, or tetractinal spiculoids. To date, two species of this genus had been described: I. mirabilis Lévi from the Indo-Pacific and I. notabilis (Duchassaing & Michelotti) from the central Atlantic. A re-examination of material previously assigned to the genera Igernella and Darwinella allowed us to detect the existence of a second species of Igernella in the central Atlantic. Igernella vansoesti sp. nov. is erected to include the specimens from the Cape Verde Islands assigned to I. notabilis by Van Soest (1993), and one specimen from the Gulf of Mexico formerly recorded under the name D. muelleriSchulze by De Laubenfels. The specimen described as D. joyeuxi Tosent by Little (1963) probably belongs to this species as well. The new species is distinguishable from I. notabilis by its massive growth habit -without conspicuous tubes-, a minutely conulose surface, small oscules, and a skeletal network, made of narrow primary and secondary fibers, denser than that of I. notabilis. There is an important amount of foreign material embedded in the mesohyl whereas it is scarce within the fibers or even absent. The absence of debris in the fibers of some species of Igernella suggests a close relationship between this genus and other genera of the family Darwinellidae. This is in agreement with a recent proposal of moving the genus Igernella from the family Dictyodendrillidae to the family Darwinellidae on the basis of their chemical affinities.
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