Litonotaster Verrill 1899

Litonotaster Verrill 1899 View in CoL .

Litonotaster Verrill 1899: 171 View in CoL ; Fisher 1911: 165; Halpern 1969:

129, 1970: 252; 1970b: 144; Clark and Downey 1992: 249.

Diagnosis (modified from Clark and Downey 1992). Body stellate, arms short, interradial arcs weakly curved to straight. Abactinal plates flat, thin, covered with surficial and marginal granules. Secondary abactinal plates absent. Papulae few in narrow regions. Marginal plates flat, more elongate than wide, surface largely bare. Actinal surface covered by granules, Furrow spines with short, blunt spines, 4 to 8, subambulacral spines in multiple rows. Pedicellariae when present, small, excavate.

Comments. Litonotaster includes 4 species, the Atlantic, L. africanus Halpern, 1969 and L. intermedius ( Perrier, 1884) as well as the East Pacific L. tumidus H.L. Clark, 1920 and the tropical North Pacific L. gfoei Mah, 2022 . All known species occur at bathyal to abyssal depths (1000 to 5000 m).

Litonotaster intermedius View in CoL is highly variable and widely occurring throughout the Atlantic. Downey in Clark and Downey (1992: 250) remarked that L. africanus View in CoL from the Gulf of Guinea “certainly” falls within the range of variation of L. intermedius View in CoL .