Anomoclausiidae Gotto, 1964

Kim, Il-Hoi, Sikorski, Andrey, O’Reilly, Myles & Boxshall, Geoff A., 2013, Copepods associated with polychaete worms in European seas, Zootaxa 3651 (1), pp. 1-62 : 5

Family Anomoclausiidae Gotto, 1964

The distinction between the families Clausidiidae and Clausiidae is not clear ( Boxshall and Halsey, 2004) and the genus Anomoclausia appears to be an intermediate taxon, sharing some character states with both of these families. Gotto (1964) noted a number of features shared by Anomoclausia and the genera of the Clausiidae , but he placed it in a separate family Anomoclausiidae , due to traits shared with the Clausidiidae , such as the 7-segmented antennules and the well-developed antenna. A phylogenetic analysis of the nereicoliform copepods by Ho (1984) placed the Anomoclausiidae in the Clausidiidae-Anomoclausiidae-Synaptiphilidae lineage. In a subsequent analysis ( Ho, 1991) the Anomoclausiidae was placed in a different lineage as sister group to the scleractinian coralinhabiting Xarifiidae . However, this analysis has repeatedly been shown to be flawed (e.g. Østergaard et al., 2003; Huys et al., 2012). We temporarily retain the Anomoclausiidae as a family here in this descriptive account, but its validity needs to be reassessed within the context of a full cladistic analysis, ideally incorporating molecular data as they become available.

Genus Anomoclausia Gotto, 1964