New species and occurrence records of Japanese Solasteridae and Ganeriidae including a new species of Paralophaster from the North Pacific with an overview of Hyalinothrix Author Mah, Christopher L. Author Fujita, Toshihiko text Zootaxa 2020 2020-03-10 4750 1 67 100 journal article 10.11646/zootaxa.4750.1.4 ff300143-3581-4909-ae95-8dec768fe27a 1175-5326 3702847 CF37CEA8-E156-48A6-8A28-C94A294A75DF Hyalinothrix grangei ( Clark & McKnight, 2001 ) nov. comb. Nepanthia grangei H. E. S. Clark & McKnight 2001: 159 . Comments. A review of diagnostic characters of Hyalinothrix versus comparable taxa in the Asterinidae indicate that Nepanthia grangei Clark & McKnight, 2001 should be re-assigned to the genus Hyalinothrix . Holotype images and the description of Nepanthia grangei showed the specimen with abactinal paxillar plates, described as tabulate, with glassine spinelets, which are absent from the definition of Nepanthia (e.g., Rowe & Marsh 1982; O’Loughlin & Waters 2004 ) and nearly all asterinids, which display spines sitting directly on abactinal and other low-lying surface plates. Nepanthia grangei was placed into Pseudonepanthia by O’Loughlin & Waters (2004) , but comparisons of the type species, Pseudonepanthia gotoi A. H. Clark 1916 show spines sitting directly on the abactinal plates ( O’Loughlin & Waters 2004 ), rather than on elongate tabulate or paxillar plates, as indicated on Nepanthia grangei . If Nepanthia grangei is re-assigned to Hyalinothrix , this has an significant outcome on the interpretation of molecular phylogenetic results presented in Mah & Foltz (2011) . In their trees ( Mah & Foltz 2011 : Fig. 2 ), Nepanthia grangei occurs on a well supported branch (93%) with Tarachaster australis and implies a sister group relationship between Nepanthia and the “paxillate ganeriids” such as Tarachaster . This taxonomic change would support Hyalinothrix and Tarachaster on a single, relatively well-supported branch, separate from Chaetaster , which was supported as sister branch to the Odontasteridae . Hyalinothrix and Tarachaster on a single branch would separate them from the Ganeriidae sensu Spencer and Wright (1966) and Fisher (1911), which included Cycethra , Perknaster , and Cuenotaster , disputing the historical interpretation of the Ganeriidae as monophyletic.