Ciona robusta Hoshino & Tokioka, 1967

Fig. 7A

References and synonymy: Ciona robusta Hoshino & Tokioka (1967) p. 276; Brunetti et al. (2015) p. 186; Ciona intestinalis type A (Sato et al. 2012) p. 1611.

Localities: 2N, 3N, 6N.

Remarks. the cosmopolitan taxon Ciona intestinalis has been recently shown to lump together several cryptic species, of which the most widespread is the so-called Ciona intestinalis type A (Caputi et al. 2007, Zahn et al. 2010). Recent work (Brunetti et al. 2015, Pennati et al. 2015) has partially clarified the taxonomy of this species complex and has shown that Ciona intestinalis type A is in fact C. robusta, a species described by Hoshino and Tokioka (1967) in Japan and later synonymized under C. intestinalis . The specimens observed had the diagnostic features of C. robusta (Sato et al. 2012, Brunetti et al. 2015), such as protuberances in the tunic near the siphons, and red pigment in the papillae at the distal end of the spermduct. The mitochondrial sequences obtained also confirm the identity of the Chilean specimens. Ciona robusta is an invasive species now established in northerncentral Chile and is expanding its distributional range (Madariaga et al. 2014).