Agelas

Agelas
Orange elephant ear sponge, Agelas clathrodes, in foreground. Two soft corals in the background: a sea fan, Iciligorgia schrammi, and a sea rod, Plexaurella nutans.
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Porifera
Class:	Demospongiae
Order:	Agelasida
Family:	Agelasidae
Genus:	Agelas Duchassaing & Michelotti, 1864 [1]
Species
See text

Agelas is a genus of demosponge. It is the only member of the family Agelasidae.

Ecology and distribution

Members of this genus are filter feeders.^[1] and occur in the West Indies, the Mediterranean Sea, the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean in shallow tropical and subtropical waters^[2] down to a depth of 30 metres (98 ft) or exceptionally 50 metres (160 ft).

Spicules

Some authorities report that the spongin fibres contain no coring spicules while others report that there are some of variable length.^[3] Fernando Parra-Velandia however, describing the Caribbean species in the group, writes that "The presence of verticillated acanthostyle spicules and a fibroreticulate skeleton of spongin fibres cored and/or echinated by spicules characterize this group."^[2]

Species

The World Register of Marine Species includes the following species in the genus:^[1]

Agelas axifera Hentschel, 1911 Agelas bispiculata Vacelet, Vasseur & Lévi, 1976 Agelas braekmani Thomas, 1998 Agelas cavernosa Thiele, 1903 Agelas cerebrum Assmann, van Soest & Köck, 2001 Agelas cervicornis (Schmidt, 1870) Agelas ceylonica Dendy, 1905 Agelas citrina Gotera & Alcolado, 1987 Agelas clathrodes (Schmidt, 1870) Agelas conifera (Schmidt, 1870) Agelas dendromorpha Lévi, 1993 Agelas dilatata Duchassaing & Michelotti, 1864 Agelas dispar Duchassaing & Michelotti, 1864 Agelas flabelliformis (Carter, 1883) Agelas gracilis Whitelegge, 1897 Agelas inaequalis Pulitzer-Finali, 1986

Agelas linnaei De Voogd, Parra-Velandia & Van Soest, 2008 Agelas marmarica Lévi, 1958 Agelas mauritiana (Carter, 1883) Agelas nakamurai Hoshino, 1985 Agelas nemoechinata Hoshino, 1985 Agelas novaecaledoniae Lévi & Lévi, 1983 Agelas oroides (Schmidt, 1864) Agelas repens Lehnert & van Soest, 1998 Agelas robusta Pulitzer-Finali, 1982 Agelas rudis Duchassaing & Michelotti, 1864 Agelas sceptrum (Lamarck, 1815) Agelas schmidti Wilson, 1902 Agelas semiglaber Pulitzer-Finali, 1996 Agelas sventres Lehnert & van Soest, 1996 Agelas tubulata Lehnert & van Soest, 1996 Agelas wiedenmayeri Alcolado, 1984

References

1. van Soest, Rob (2012). R. W. M. Van Soest, N. Boury-Esnault, J. N. A. Hooper, K. Rützler, N. J. de Voogd, B. Alvarez de Glasby, E. Hajdu, A. B. Pisera, R. Manconi, C. Schoenberg, D. Janussen, K. R. Tabachnick, M. Klautau, B. Picton, M. Kelly & J. Vacelet, ed. "Agelas Duchassaing & Michelotti, 1864". World Porifera database. World Register of Marine Species. Retrieved 2012-08-01.
2. Parra-Velandia, Fernando J.; Zea, Sven; Van Soest, Rob W. M. (2014). "Reef sponges of the genus Agelas (Porifera: Demospongiae) from the Greater Caribbean" (PDF). Zootaxa 3794 (3): 301–343. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.3794.3.1.
3. Hoshino, Takaharo (1985). "Description of two new species of the genus Agelas (Demispongia) from Zamari Island, the Ryukyus, Japan". Proceedings of the Zoological Society of Japan 30: 1–10.