Jobnson 3Fun^ 



A NEW STARFISH FROM PUERTO RICO 



By AUSTIN H. CLARK 



Curator, Division of Echinoderms, U.S. National Museum 



(With One Plate) 



Among the starfishes obtained by the First Johnson-Smithsonian 

 Deep-Sea Expedition on the 1933 cruise are two specimens of a 

 new species of Odinia. The discovery of a species of Odinia in the 

 West Indian region is especially interesting, as the family Brisingidae, 

 to which it belongs, although well represented on the Atlantic coasts 

 of Africa and of Europe, is known from the Caribbean region only 

 from the single somewhat problematical genus Hymcnodiscus, which 

 was described from a single species represented by two evidently 

 young individuals. 



This new species of Odinia may be known as — 



ODINIA ANTILLENSIS, n. sp. 



Locality. — Caroline station 47; west of Puerto Rico (lat. iS°i/2o" 

 X., long.'67°25' W.— lat. i8°i7'o5" N., long. 67°24'45" W.) ; 280 

 to 340 fathoms; February 13, 1933. One specimen (U.S.N.M. 

 no. E.3266 [type]). 



Description. — The disk is 27 mm in diameter ; the border, which 

 is 5 mm high, rises abruptly at an angle of about 65° from the arm 

 bases to the flat abactinal surface. The abactinal surface is entirely 

 covered with small polygonal plates elevated in the center, which 

 become larger and more solid toward the margin. There are long 

 and conspicuous papulae in practically all the interstices between these 

 plates. Each plate bears on its elevated irregular central portion a 

 group of 2 to 16 (usually 4 to 10) short spines of various lengths, 

 the longest of which seldom exceeds in height half the length of the 

 plate, and also several to many pedicellariac. Narrow bare channels 

 run down the beveled border of the disk between the arm bases and 

 are continued outward between the arm bases as much broader and 

 more conspicuous bare channels 2 mm in width for a distance of 

 about 8 mm over eight or nine apposed pairs of marginal plates. 



Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, Vol. 91, No. 14 



