OPHIDIASTERIDAE Verrill, 1870

Mah, Christopher L., 2021, The East Pacific / South Pacific Boundary: New taxa and occurrences from Rapa Nui (Easter Island), New Caledonia and adjacent regions, Zootaxa 4980 (3), pp. 401-450 : 418

OPHIDIASTERIDAE Verrill, 1870

Comments. Mah & Foltz (2011) showed the Ophidiasteridae as paraphyletic with some genera supported as members of the Goniasteridae . Mah (2017) provisionally diagnosed the Ophidiasteridae and outlined several of the morphological character diagnoses for the Ophidiasteridae throughout its history. Mah’s (2017) treatment included efforts to separate genera such as Neoferdina and Ferdina into the Goniasteridae and to establish some character boundaries between the Goniasteridae and the Ophidiasteridae .

Although the taxonomic boundaries of the Ophidiasteridae has not been comprehensively established, data from Mah & Foltz (2011) suggest that taxa, such as Linckia or Leiaster , which are similar to more typological forms, such as Ophidiaster are supported as members of the Ophidiasteridae . Mah (2017) outlined diagnostic characters for the Ophidiasteridae , including the small disk, elongate, cylindrical arms, granular covering and putatively, tesselate abactinal plates as well as the identical appearance of the marginal and abactinal plates. However, both Mah & Foltz (2017) and some treatments of ophidiasterid affinities, such as those of Fisher (1919: 370) suggested that some genera, lacking the identical marginal and abactinal plate character, such as Narcissia could be justifiably placed among the Goniasteridae , suggesting further adjustments to the Ophidiasteridae are warranted.