Cuniculomaera Tandberg & Jazdzewska 2024, gen. nov.
Creators: name: (SOSA), Senckenberg Ocean Species Alliance
name: Brandt, Angelika
name: Chen, Chong
name: Engel, Laura
name: Esquete, Patricia
name: Horton, Tammy
name: Jażdżewska, Anna M.
name: Johannsen, Nele
name: Kaiser, Stefanie
name: Kihara, Terue C.
name: Knauber, Henry
name: Kniesz, Katharina
name: Landschoff, Jannes
name: Lörz, Anne-Nina
name: Machado, Fabrizio M.
name: Martínez-Muñoz, Carlos A.
name: Riehl, Torben
name: Serpell-Stevens, Amanda
name: Sigwart, Julia D.
name: Tandberg, Anne Helene S.
name: Tato, Ramiro
name: Tsuda, Miwako
name: Vončina, Katarzyna
name: Watanabe, Hiromi K.
name: Wenz, Christian
name: Williams, Jason D.
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2024
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Malacostraca
Amphipoda
Maeridae
Cuniculomaera

description: Cuniculomaera Tandberg & Jażdżewska gen. nov.
Composition: One valid species, which is described herein; Cuniculomaera grata Tandberg & Jażdżewska, sp. nov.
Cuniculomaera grata Tandberg & Jażdżewska. Type species.
Diagnosis
Small round eyes. Accessory flagellum 8 - articulate. Pereopod 2 propodus suboval, palmar corner not sharply defined, dactylus smooth and sharp. Epimeral plates smooth, epimeral plate 3 with sharp tooth. Uropod 3 elongate, rami of similar length, covered by bushy setae. Telson deeply and widely cleft.
Etymology
Cuniculomaera is a compound noun formed from the Latin second-declension noun cuniculus (burrow) and the suffix - maera from Maera, the type genus of the family Maeridae. Gender: feminine.
Taxon discussion
The decision to erect a new genus for Cuniculomaera grata Tandberg & Jażdżewska, sp. nov. (described below) comes from it differing in diagnostic characters from all initially eligible genera within the family Maeridae Krapp-Schickel, 2008. The placement of the genus into Maeridae follows the discussion in Krapp-Schickel (2008), where she separates the Ceradocus - Elasmopus - Maera - group from Melitidae Bousfield, 1973, based on the equiramous uropod 3 in this group compared with the parviramous uropod 3 in Melitidae. The use of the defining morphological characters of uropod 3 is kept by Lowry and Myers (2013), who also keeps Maeridae separate from the morphologically quite similar Hadziidae S. Karaman, 1943 due to the morphology of the gills. It should also be noted that Hadziidae are exclusively freshwater species. The gills of Cuniculomaera grata sp. nov. are not stalked (rather “ normal ” for marine species), again placing the new genus within Maeridae.
The equiramous uropod 3 of Cuniculomaera gen. nov. can be observed in Fig. 14. Sadly, uropod 3 was lost in the specimen that was sampled. Placing it in the Maera Leach, 1814 s. l. group (sensu Krapp-Schickel 2008) comes from it differing from Ceradocus A. Costa, 1853 in its epimeral plate 3 not being serrated (it is smooth, with a clear tooth), the shape of the telson (the lobes being slender and with two small teeth compared to the one tip on each lobe “ Ceradocus - telson ”) and the dorsal shape of the urosome which is smooth compared to the “ can have teeth ” of Ceradocus. It differs from Elasmopus A. Costa, 1853 by having a long accessory flagellum (not short as for Elasmopus) and in the shape of the mandibular palp article 3 (the Elasmopus article is falcate, Cuniculomaera has this palp straight) and epimeral plate 3 posterior corner being a sharp tooth compared to the Elasmopus blunt corner.
Maera s. l. was split into several genera by Krapp-Schickel (2008); the present new genus can be separated from these by the combination of the accessory flagellum, eye-shape, pereopods 1 and 2 shapes, epimeral plate 3 posterior corner and telson-shapes. It also differs in its depth range, albeit this is not a diagnostic character.
The obtained sequence was positively checked as belonging to Amphipoda against the Barcode of Life Data System (BOLD) and GenBank databases; however, with only ca. 80 % similarity to published sequences. The closest relative in GenBank was Uristes gigas Dana, 1852 (78.97 % similarity, acc. No. MH 825809.1) while in BOLD: Wimvadocus torelli (Goës, 1866) (79.97 %, sample ID: BSM 08 T 16-01, record not available in GenBank). The number of publicly available sequences of Maeridae is relatively low (164 sequences of which 62 belong to only two species), while the family is represented by 423 species grouped in 48 genera (Horton et al. 2023). A phylogenetic analysis was not conducted; only the barcode of the new species is provided for future use.
description: Published as part of (SOSA), Senckenberg Ocean Species Alliance, Brandt, Angelika, Chen, Chong, Engel, Laura, Esquete, Patricia, Horton, Tammy, Jażdżewska, Anna M., Johannsen, Nele, Kaiser, Stefanie, Kihara, Terue C., Knauber, Henry, Kniesz, Katharina, Landschoff, Jannes, Lörz, Anne-Nina, Machado, Fabrizio M., Martínez-Muñoz, Carlos A., Riehl, Torben, Serpell-Stevens, Amanda, Sigwart, Julia D., Tandberg, Anne Helene S., Tato, Ramiro, Tsuda, Miwako, Vončina, Katarzyna, Watanabe, Hiromi K., Wenz, Christian & Williams, Jason D., 2024, Ocean Species Discoveries 1 – 12 — A primer for accelerating marine invertebrate taxonomy, pp. e 128431 in Biodiversity Data Journal 12 on page e128431, DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.12.e128431