Three new species of Sollasella (Porifera: Demospongiae: Axinellida: Raspailiidae) from Western Australia

WA Museum Records and Supplements | Updated 2 years ago

ABSTRACT – The sponge genus Sollasella has three named species, two from eastern Australia, (Queensland and New South Wales) and one from the western Arabian Sea. Using a combination of morphological and molecular data, we describe three new species from northern Western Australia. We sequenced Cytochrome Oxidase I and two different fragments of 28S to reconstruct genealogical relationships among species in the genus. Sollasella suttonorum sp. nov. is closest morphologically to the two previously known Australian species: S. digitata Lendenfeld, 1888 and S. moretonensis van Soest, Hooper, Beglinger and Erpenbeck 2006. However, S. ananas sp. nov., and S. maraca sp. nov. show a novel clubbed or oval (rather than digitate or lobed) morphology. These two species contain a unique spicule type (anatriaene-like) not previously reported in the Axinellida. As a consequence of this study the species diversity of Sollasella is doubled to six species, with all species confined to the Indian and Pacific oceans.