@article{1d18e4ce26454ab3b81d9a38bf4bf194,
title = "A new species of predatory nudibranch (Gastropoda: Trinchesiidae) of the coral pavona decussata",
abstract = "Some nudibranchs are predators of scleractinian corals, but little is known about their diversity. Here we describe Phestilla fuscostriata sp. nov., the first species of nudibranch that preys on Pavona decussata, a structure-forming agariciid species in the South China Sea. This new species has a white body with brown pigmentation on the dorsum and cerata, and exhibits excellent mimicry by matching the colour of its coral host. The nudibranch lays crescent-shaped egg masses on the coral surface, where the embryos develop and hatch in 2–3 weeks. This new species possesses a large number of cerata that are arranged in widely-spaced rows, with each row having one dorsal ceras and zero to several ventral cerata, which distinguishes it from all other congeneric species. A comparison of the mitochondrial COI and 16S rRNA genes and the nuclear H3 gene between P. fuscostriata sp. nov. and other Phestilla spp. found that their interspecific distances are large enough to justify the recognition of the new species.",
keywords = "Coral health, Coral-eating, Corallivory, Molecular phylogeny, Phestilla",
author = "Juntong Hu and Yanjie Zhang and Xie, {James Yang} and Jianwen QIU",
note = "Funding Information: This work and the new species name have been registered with ZooBank under urn: lsid:zoobank.org:pub:EA11933D-86A4-468E-96F1-ADC630960385. This study was supported by The Environment and Conservation Fund (34/2019, 03/2017) and The General Research Fund (12102018) of the University Grants Committee of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, and Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Guangzhou) (GML2019ZD0404). We thank Yu Zhao for taking some of the photographs used in this paper. Funding Information: name have been registered with ZooBank under urn: lsid:zoobank.org:pub:EA11933D-86A4-468E-96F1-ADC630960385. This study was supported by The Environment and Conservation Fund (34/2019, 03/2017) and The General Research Fund (12102018) of the University Grants Committee of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, and Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Guangzhou) (GML2019ZD0404). We thank Yu Zhao for taking some of the photographs used in this paper.",
year = "2020",
month = jul,
day = "14",
doi = "10.6620/ZS.2020.59-30",
language = "English",
volume = "59",
pages = "1--11",
journal = "Zoological Studies",
issn = "1021-5506",
publisher = "Academia Sinica",
}