Cerithiopsis iota (C. B. Adams, 1845 )

Pimenta, Alexandre Dias, Faria, Raquel Garofalo De Souza, Figueira, Raquel Medeiros Andrade & Fernandes, Maurício Romulo, 2024, Unraveling another of the ‘ Big Fiveʹ: new species and records of Cerithiopsidae from Brazil (Caenogastropoda: Triphoroidea), Zootaxa 5494 (1), pp. 1-71 : 62

Cerithiopsis iota (C. B. Adams, 1845) and Cerithiopsis cynthiae Bartsch, 1911

Cerithiopsis iota , described from Jamaica, was considered by Rios (1985, 1994, 2009) as a synonym of C. gemmulosa (an opinion not followed in the literature). Absalão & Pimenta (2005) and Santos et al. (2007) recorded C. iota from eastern Brazil.

Cerithiopsis cynthiae , described from Bermuda, was first recorded from Brazil by Rios (2009), based on a micrograph of a shell that resembles C. flava with a broken protoconch.

Odé (1989) considered C. iota as the “central form” of a complex including C. iota , C. flava , and C. pesa . De Jong & Coomans (1988) considered it as a senior synonym of C. cynthiae . Rolán et al. (2007) considered it as a nomen dubium, but it as a synonym of C. flava (however, the illustrations of the holotype of C. flava in Rolán et al. 2007 (Pl. XII, fig. 108) actually is the holotype of C. albovittata .

Cerithiopsis iota is considered an available name in MolluscaBase (2023) and a senior synonym of C. cynthiae according to De Jong & Coomans (1988). The type is very eroded ( Clench & Turner, 1950), although it is indeed very similar to the syntypes of C. cynthiae . Its identity and relationships cannot be evaluated until new material from the type locality is obtained. For those reasons, and considering the images provided by Rios (1985, 2009) in comparison to the types, we believe that the records of C. iota and C. cynthiae from Brazil cannot be considered reliable.