Taxonomic revision of the ciliate genus Zosterodasys Deroux, 1978 (Protista: Ciliophora: Synhymeniida) Author Vďačný, Peter Author Tirjaková, Eva text Zootaxa 2012 3345 34 58 journal article 10.5281/zenodo.281497 727bd4b2-eff4-47dc-907c-e7e92d39e951 1175-5326 281497 Zosterodasys agamalievi Deroux, 1978 ( Figs 4 A–J, 5A–E) Chilodontopsis vorax – Kahl 1933 : 66 , fig. 6, 21 ; Agamaliev 1967 : 20 , figs 9 and 10. Chilodontopsis transversa Kahl, 1928 : 78 , fig. 15b (partim; specimens from Oldesloer saltwaters). Zosterodasys agamalievi Deroux, 1978 : 466 , fig. 6; Agamaliev 1983 : 71 , fig. 27 (synonymization of C. vorax with Z. agamalievi ); Fernandez-Leborans & Alekperov 1996 : 5 , fig. 7 (taxonomic revision); Kivimaki et al. 1997 : 226 , figs 1–36 (ultrastructure); Jankowski 2007 : 729 ; Kivimaki et al. 2009 : 323 , fig. 1 (18S rRNA gene sequence, phylogenetic position). Zosterodasys cantabrica Fernandez-Leborans & Alekperov, 1996 : 5 , figs 4–6; Jankowski 2007 : 729 . Zosterodasys caspica Fernandez-Leborans & Alekperov, 1996 : 5 , fig. 1; Jankowski 2007 : 729 . Diagnosis. Size about 90–150 × 30–55 µm in vivo . Body shape broadly to narrowly obovate or elliptical with left margin anteriorly slightly projecting. Macronucleus ellipsoidal to very narrowly ellipsoidal and sometimes curved with a single globular micronucleus. Several scattered contractile vacuoles. About 50–95 ciliary rows. Synhymenium incompletely encircles cell. On average 13 (10–16) nematodesmal rods. Marine. Type locality. Brackish water around the Biological Station at Roscoff, France . Type material. Deroux (1978) did not mention deposition of type slides of Z. agamalievi . Fernandez-Leborans & Alekperov (1996) deposited several syntype slides (registration numbers 1669 a–f) with silver carbonateimpregnated specimens of Z. cantabrica in the Laboratoria de Biologia General, Facultad de Biologia, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain . Voucher material. The 18S rRNA gene sequence of a population from the Atlantic coast of the Delmarva Peninsula, USA was deposited in GenBank (accession number FJ008926 ) by Kivimaki et al. (2009) . Etymology. Deroux (1978) dedicated this species to the Azerbaijani protozoologist, F. G. Agamaliev, who first discovered this species but misidentified it as Chilodontopsis vorax . Remarks. Vďaċný & Tirjaková (2012) pointed out that Kahl (1928) very likely mixed Z. agamalievi and Z. transversus in his description of C. transversa . Specifically, they supposed that specimens from Oldesloer saltwaters are a misidentified Z. agamalievi , while those from a duck pond near Gasthof Saselbek are Z. transversus . Subsequently, Kahl (1931) erroneously synonymized his C. transversa with C. vorax , as first recognized by Foissner et al. (1994) . Agamaliev (1967) following Kahl’s classification misidentified his two Caspian populations as C. vorax . This was already mentioned by Deroux (1978) , who established Z. agamalievi for a French marine population and assumed that Agamaliev’s (1967) saltwater strains also belong to that species. Consequently, Agamaliev (1983) considered his C. vorax as a taxonomic synonym of Z. agamalievi and assigned his Caspian populations to the latter species. However, this was only partially recognized by Fernandez-Leborans & Alekperov (1996) , who considered Agamaliev’s strain II as Z. agamalievi , but established a new species, Z. caspica , for Agamaliev’s strain I. As its overall morphology also closely matches the original description of Z. agamalievi by Deroux (1978) , we find Z. caspica as its subjective junior synonym. Finally, we suggest to synonymize Z. cantabrica with Z. agamalievi because their body size (110–150 µm vs. 90–150 µm) and number of the ciliary rows (28–34 vs. about 30 ventral kineties) and nematodesmal rods (10–12 vs. 12–16) are similar. We suppose that the group of the fibre structures around the oral opening and the fibrillar loop near the dorsal portion of the synhymenium ( Figs 4 E, I, J) found in Z. cantabrica are either artifacts produced during silver carbonate preparations or structures not stained with the protargol method used by other researches ( Agamaliev 1967 , 1983 ; Deroux 1978 ; Kivimaki et al. 2007, 2009).