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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 August 2013
Exploration of continental shelves may produce unexpected faunal records. In shelf waters of La Guajira peninsula, Colombia, in the northern tip of South America, southern Caribbean Sea, we found a new species of Rhaphidhistia (Demospongiae, Hadromerida, Trachycladidae) a genus previously thought to be restricted to the Indo-Pacific Ocean. Rhaphidhistia guajiraensis sp. nov. is thickly encrusting, agglutinating bottom debris; it possesses asymmetric oxea as megascleres (465–757 μm by 6.3–17.5 μm) and spiraster-like spinispirae (15–37 μm by 2–5 μm). It is closely similar to the type species of the genus, R. spectabilis Carter, 1879, both standing apart from a third species, R. mirabilis (Dendy, 1924), thus conforming a natural group whose taxonomic placement needs to be reassessed. There are numerous cases of sponge genera with sister species in the Indo-Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans, possibly split since the Tethys Sea breakup; owing to their restricted or deep distribution, they are just starting to be discovered.