On a new species of Lysmata Risso, 1816 (Decapoda, Caridea, Lysmatidae) from the tropical eastern Atlantic

Abstract

During fieldwork on Tenerife (Canary Islands) and São Tomé in the eastern Atlantic, three specimens belonging to the genus Lysmata were collected in an underwater cave and tunnel. The specimens are similar to a species known from a single specimen collected in Guam in the tropical western Pacific: Lysmata guamensis Anker & Cox, 2011. With this species it shares many morphological characteristics, in special the rostral dentition of only two dorsal teeth, of which one situated post-orbital and the other one on the rostrum proper, which is unique in the genus. Its phylogenetic position in the genus Lysmata is reconstructed on the basis of the mitochondrial 16S RNA marker. The specimens are here described and figured as a species new to science.