Preliminary Notice of a New Interesting 

 Ophiuran (Astrophiura kawamurai). 



By 



il. Mattininolo, Rigakushi. 



Zool. Inst., Sci. Coll., Tokyo. 



{With Plate III.) 



Together with the curious Crinoid which I have described in ano- 

 ther paper published in this journal under the name of Phrynocrinus 

 ohtortits, an interesting specimen of apparently a new species of 

 As trop hin ra was sent me by Mr. K. Aoki of the Misaki Marine 

 Laboratory. The two were said to have been obtained at the same 

 locality and on the same day. The specimen in question I have 

 called A. kawamurai. Deferring its full description to a future paper, 

 I propose to give here a preliminary notice of it. 



Astrophiura kawamurai, n. sp. 



Diameter of the pentagonal body 12 mm; that of the disk proper, 

 or of the circle passing through the outer ends of radial shields, 7 

 mm. Length of the free arms, 6 mm. Width of same close to the 

 pentagonal body, 0.4 mm. 



In all essential features this species is like the genotype (A. 

 permird). On the dorsal side, the pentagonal " asteroid " body is 

 entirely covered over by stout primary plates and radial shields of 

 the disk proper and by the dorsal and lateral arm-plates of modified 

 arm bases. The primary plates consist of the single central, five 

 basais, five radiais, five first interradiais and five second interradiais. 

 The infrabasals, basais and interradiais are elevated above the level 

 of the central, radiais and radial shields, so as to form a regular 

 symmetrical system of ridges. Dorsal arm- plates number 7 or 8 in 



