Porcellanaster ceruleus Thomson, 1877

Madeira, Patrícia, Kroh, Andreas, Cordeiro, Ricardo, De, António M., Martins, Frias & Ávila, Sérgio P., 2019, The Echinoderm Fauna of the Azores (NE Atlantic Ocean), Zootaxa 4639 (1), pp. 1-231 : 82

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.