Parasphaerascleridae, McFadden, Catherine S. & Ofwegen, Leen P. van, 2013

McFadden, Catherine S. & Ofwegen, Leen P. van, 2013, Molecular phylogenetic evidence supports a new family of octocorals and a new genus of Alcyoniidae (Octocorallia, Alcyonacea), ZooKeys 346, pp. 59-83 : 65-66

Parasphaerascleridae fam. n.

Type genus.

Parasphaerasclera McFadden & Ofwegen, gen. n.

Included genera.

Parasphaerasclera gen. n.

Diagnosis.

Soft corals with a digitiform, digitate or lobate growth form, usually with a sterile stalk although this may be indistinct. Polyps monomorphic. Permanent calyces absent, although retracted polyps may remain visible as small mounds on the polyparium surface. Anthocodial sclerites absent. Sclerites of colony surface and interior predominantly radiates and tuberculate spheroids, occasionally rods and crosses. Sclerites permanently colored. Azooxanthellate.

Remarks.

As diagnosed by Verseveldt and Bayer (1988) and modified by Williams (2003), the alcyoniid genus Eleutherobia Pütter, 1900 encompasses species with a diversity of sclerite forms and arrangements. Species within this genus are united primarily by their digitiform to lobular colony growth forms, although the diagnosis was recently emended to include capitate forms ( Williams 2003). A subset of the species within Eleutherobia have in common a complete lack of sclerites in the polyps, and the sclerites in the surface and interior of the colony are predominantly small radiates and spheroids (Figs 4-9). Molecular analyses unite these species in a clade far removed phylogenetically from other genera of Alcyoniidae (Fig. 1), thus we describe a new family to accommodate them. Parasphaerascleridae fam. n. falls outside of the large Holaxonia - Alcyoniina clade of Octocorallia to which the majority of soft corals belong ( McFadden et al. 2006). Although several other genera of Alcyoniidae also lie outside of Holaxonia - Alcyoniina (e.g., Paraminabea , Anthomastus , Sphaerasclera gen. n.), they are united with the scleraxonian families Coralliidae and Paragorgiidae in the Anthomastus - Corallium clade ( McFadden et al. 2006). Paraphaerascleridae fam. n. does not belong to that clade.