The future of endangered crayfish in light of protected areas and habitat fragmentation.

The long-term survival of a species requires, among other things, gene flow between populations. Approaches for the evaluation of fragmentation in the frame of freshwater habitats consider only a small amount of the information that combined demography and geography are currently able to provide. This study addresses two species of Austropotamobius crayfish in the light of population genetics, spatial ecology and protected areas of the Carpathians. Advancing the classical approaches, we defined ecological distances upon the rasterised river network as a surrogate of habitat resistance to migration, quantifying the deviations from the species´ suitability range for a set of relevant geospatial variables in each cell of the network. Molecular analyses revealed the populations of the two Austropotamobius crayfish species are clearly distinct, lacking hybridisation. Comparing pairs of populations, we found, in some cases, a strong disagreement regarding genetic and ecological distances, potentially due to human-mediated translocations or the geophysical phenomena of regressive erosion, which may have led to unexpected colonisation routes. Protected areas were found to offer appropriate local habitat conditions but failed to ensure connectivity. The methodology applied in this study allowed us to quantify the contribution of each geospatial (environmental) variable to the overall effect of fragmentation, and we found that water quality was the most important variable. A multilevel approach proved to reveal a better understanding of drivers behind the distribution patterns, which can lead to more adequate conservation measures.

New species and new records of Cumacea (Crustacea: Peracarida: Cumacea) from mesophotic reefs of Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands, Caribbean Sea.

The cumacean fauna of the Caribbean mesophotic reefs is remarkably rich but understudied. Herein, we present the description of 22 new species of the family Nannastacidae, including one from shallow reefs, 20 of them belonging to Cumella (Cumella) and two new species belonging to the subgenus Cumewingia. We have also included range extensions and new locations for ten previously known species of Cumella, two species in the genus Vaunthompsonia (family Bodotriidae) and one species in the genus Cubanocuma (family Nannastacidae). Taxonomic keys are provided for the western tropical Atlantic species of Cumella (Cumella) and Cumella (Cumewingia), separately for the adult males and females. Large sampling efforts and careful systematic studies, even in relatively well-characterized regions such as the Caribbean, can yield a surprising number of new discoveries. Our current findings emphasize our previous assertion that the mesophotic reefs are treasure troves of undiscovered benthic fauna and might be qualified as biodiversity hotspots.

New records of Bodotriidae (Crustacea: Cumacea) from Puerto Rico with descriptions of three new species.

In a continuing effort to describe the cumacean fauna of Puerto Rico we describe three new species of Bodotriidae, a family that has never been reported from Puerto Rico before.  While finding and describing new microcrustacean species may not be an impossible task, if there is available taxonomic expertise, the currently described species were found in large numbers within a short distance from the Marine Laboratories of the University of Puerto Rico where the local reefs have been studied for over half a century, highlighting the large gaps that exist in our estimates of Caribbean marine diversity.  The three new species, Cyclaspis gurui sp. nov., Cyclaspis mariae sp. nov. and Vaunthompsonia budaii sp. nov. are reported from a fringing reef off La Parguera, southwest coast of Puerto Rico and Vaunthompsonia cristata Bate, 1858 represents a new record for Puerto Rico from the mesophotic reefs.

Three new Nannastacidae (Crustacea: Cumacea) species from a Caribbean mesophotic ecosystem.

Examination of substrata from the mesophotic reefs of Mona Island, Puerto Rico yielded 3 new species of cumaceans, all from the family Nannastacidae: Cumella achimae sp. nov., C. victoriae sp. nov. and Nannastacus craciuni sp. nov. The 3 new species bring the total of new cumacean taxa described from the mesophotic reefs of US Caribbean to 9, highlighting the potential of mesophotic reefs as a biodiversity hotspot. For the first time we report the genus Nannastacus from the Caribbean Sea.