Revisão e identificação dos Eunicidae Berthold, 1827 (Annelida, Polychaeta) da Coleção de Invertebrados Paulo Young, UFPB, com ênfase no gênero Leodice Lamarck, 1818

Abstract

The Eunicidae Berthold (1827) represent one of the oldest and numerous families of Annelida, composed by 453 species in 12 genera; of these 7 was reported from the Brazilian coast, that has 64 species. During most of the 20th century, the genus Leodice was sinonimised with Eunice, nonetheless after phylogetic and molecular analysis, the genus Leodice was recovered, coresponding to specimes that contain at least one of it’s diagnostic characteristics (prostomial appenices with regular articulations, compound falcigers tridentate, subacicular hooks ligth, anterior aciculae ligthter than the others, but with the same tonality color in median and posterior setigers, and a lateral black point on posterior setigrs). Presently the genus Leodice is considered the sister clade of the remaining eunicids. This study sought analyze and correctly evaluate the identity the eunicids deposited at the CIPY colection. The material examined was collected during the 1980’s, along the States of Alagoas, Bahia, Ceará, Paraíba, Pernambuco, Piauí and Rio Grande do Norte, and during the 2000’s, at Cabo Branco Beach, located in the State ofParaíba. All these materials were deposited and located in the CIPY colection. The identifications were arrived at from external and internal morphological analysis, based on specialized bibliography. 386 eunicid specimens were analyzed, in 6 of the 7 genera described from Brazil. The genus Leodice represented more than 50% of the analyzed material, distributed in 6 species, including the first record in South America for Leodice cf. schizobranchia, the first record in the sState of Rio Grande do Norte for Leodice marcusi, first record of Leodice rubra from the States of Ceará and Pernambuco, and new occourrence from Leodice calcaricola, Leodice ivanildae and Leodice unifrons for the Paraiba coast. Eunice was also analyzed regarding historical relationship between the genera, describing the first record of Eunice cf. marconii from the Brazilian Northeast. This study reinforces the importance of biological collections to expand knowledge about biodiversity, in addition enabling an analysis of biodiversity in space-time. Moreover it reiterates the importance of taxonomic studies, possibliting thate new studies have an adequate bases for comparion