Ophioderma Mueller & Troschel, 1840

Pineda-Enriquez, Tania, Solis-Marin, Francisco A., Hooker, Yuri & Alfredo Laguarda-Figueras,, 2013, Ophioderma peruana, a new species of brittlestar (Echinodermata, Ophiuroidea, Ophiodermatidae) from the Peruvian coast, ZooKeys 357, pp. 53-65 : 54

Genus Ophioderma Mueller & Troschel, 1840

Type species.

Ophioderma longicauda (Bruzelius, 1805).

Diagnosis.

(modified from Müller and Troschel 1840) The dorsal and ventral surfaces of the disc are covered by granules. Sometimes these granules cover the radial and adoral shields. Oral papillae are broader than long, rectangular or conical in shape. There are three to five teeth. The oral shields are oval, pentagonal or triangular in shape. Each interradial space has four genital slits; the first two are on the distal side of the oral shield and the second are parallel to the arms and near the disc edge. The arms are cylindrical proximally and conical distally. The dorsal arm plates are broader than long and can be fragmented. The lateral arm plates are semi-lunar in outline and have six to thirteen arm spines that are large, rectangular or conical in shape. There are two tentacle scales per segment.

Remarks.

There are six known species of the genus reported for the eastern and southern Pacific in addition to the new species described here.