Porcellanaster ceruleus Thomson, 1877

Reports for the Azores:

Porcellanaster inermis $ Perrier, 1885c: 50–53, 1894: 212–215, pl. 15, fig. 3; Mortensen 1927a: 52;

Porcellanaster ceruleus Thomson, 1877 — $ Lieberkind 1935: 5–19, figs. 1–5, pl. 2, figs. 1–8, pl. 3, fig. 12, pl. 5, figs. 16–17; Madsen 1961: 126–142, figs. 22–24; Dilman 2006: 179–180, 2008: 137, 2013: 568, 2014: 29.

Type locality: off Delaware, USA (38°34’N, 72°10’W) .

See: Lieberkind (1935); Madsen (1961); A.M. Clark & Downey (1992: 100–101, figs. 18a–c, 19d, f, i, pl. 27, figs. A–Q); Dilman (2006; 2008).

Occurrence: deep-water cosmopolitan, except in the Antarctic; from the Davis Strait south to off Cape Cod, eastwards from south of Iceland along the European and African continental slopes to South Africa (Madsen 1961), and in the Azores and the Charlie-Gibbs Fracture Zone, in the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (Perrier 1894, Dilman 2008).

Depth: 1,158 –6,035 m, mostly between 1,600 –3,000 m (Madsen 1961); AZO: 2,995 m (Perrier 1894).

Habitat: soft substrates, mud, Globigerina ooze to clay (Madsen 1961); juveniles prey on foraminiferans and adults are deposit-feeders, burrowing in the sediment (Sumida et al. 2001).

Larval stage: lecithotrophic (Sumida et al. 2001).

Remarks: Perrier (1885b, c, 1894) described Porcellanaster inermis, to house the specimens collected by Talisman at waters between Cape Verde and NE Africa (sta 101, 1883: 16°38’00”N, 18°23’46”W, 3200 m) and in the Azores (sta 131, 1883: 38°38’N, 25°05’46”W, 2995 m). On his report on the porcellanasterids from the Danish- Ingolf expedition, Lieberkind (1935) established the synonymy of P. inermis with P. ceruleus . With the exception of the three specimens collected by Talisman no other animals belonging to this species were ever reported from Azorean waters.