Polysyncraton cuculliferum ( Sluiter, 1909 )

Kott, Patricia, 2007, New and little-known species of Didemnidae (Ascidiacea, Tunicata) from Australia (part 4), Journal of Natural History 41 (17 - 20), pp. 1163-1211 : 1170

Polysyncraton cuculliferum ( Sluiter, 1909)

( Figure 6G )

Diplosomoides cuculliferum Sluiter 1909, p 90 .

Polysyncraton cuculliferum: Kott 2005a, p 60 and synonymy.

Distribution

Previously recorded (see Kott 2005a): Queensland ( Great Barrier Reef ); Northern Territory ( Darwin ); Western Pacific ( Solomon Is , Indonesia). New record: Queensland (Great Barrier Reef: 17.935 ° S, 146.785 ° E, 36 m, QM G308858 ) .

Description

The colony is a small scrap, with a typically pointed surface papillum associated with each branchial aperture and a thin layer of surface test over large common cloacal canals lined on each side by zooids. Large conspicuous common cloacal openings are elevated above the surface. Spicules are stellate, to 0.08 mm diameter or more, with 9–13 long, pointed, conical rays in optical transverse section, and they are present throughout the colony. The delicate zooids have a moderately short but wide thorax, about 10 stigmata per half row, a wide open atrial aperture with a long bifid anterior lip, six conspicuous pointed branchial lobes, an oval lateral organ about halfway down the body wall on each side of the thorax, a retractor muscle of variable length, and four coils of the vas deferens around four or five testis follicles.

Figures

Figure 6. Scanning electron micrographs. (A) Atriolum irregulare (QM G323245); (B) Leptoclinides albamaculatus (QM G308876); (C) Leptoclinides dubius (QM G308892); (D) Leptoclinides durus (QM G308894); (E) Leptoclinides fluxus (QM G308817); (F) Leptoclinides placidus (QM G308766); (G) Polysyncraton cuculliferum (QM G3088458); (H) Polysyncraton gratum (QM G308891).