- Animals
- ›Echinoderms
- ›Sea Stars and Brittle Stars
- ›Sea Stars
- ›Valvatacean Sea Stars
- ›Valvatidan Sea Stars
- ›Cushion Stars, Carpet Stars, and Allies
- ›Aquilonastra
Aquilonastra chantalae
Aquilonastra chantalae is a species of starfish from the family Asterinidae. Asterinid sea stars are typically quite small with an often pentagonal-shaped body, though there are exceptions. They are dorsally flattened and have short arms. The body's thin periphery is built up by very small marginal plates. One distinct characteristic of those in this family is the presence of an aboral face shaped by crescent-like plates.
From the article Aquilonastra chantalae on Wikipedia (CC BY-SA), quoted section by section
Description
Aquilonastra chantalae is a fissiparous Aquilonastra species that can have a radius up to a size of 4mm. Organisms of this species generally have 5–7 rays, with the most prominent number being 6 and the most rare being 7. The rays are discrete with a wide basal end and taper distally to the rounded end. At a radial size of 4mm, the star may have rays 5. On the other hand, smaller stars could have up to 7 rays. Specimens of this kind have mostly digitiform abactinal spinelets. They also have actinal interradial spines which are predominantly subsacciform.
Range & habitat
This species can be found within the Mozambique Channel on the island of Europa and other scattered islands. It can also be found in the Indian Ocean.
Wikipedia: “Distribution”
In human culture
The species was named chantalae in reverence of the great contributions to the research of echinoderms done by Chantal Conand. Conand was a professor at the University of La Reunion.
== References ==
Wikipedia: “Etymology”
Where it lives
Recorded sightings
—
geo-referenced records in GBIF, from museums, herbaria and field observers.
Drag the globe to turn it. Dots are where records exist, not a range map; darker means more records.
In the stacks
Searching the stacks…
Every page naming Aquilonastra chantalae in the Biodiversity Heritage Library →
This page is assembled live from iNaturalist, GBIF, Wikipedia, the Source Library and the Internet Archive. It is not yet part of the hand-edited codex. iNaturalist taxon 1165751.