A New Species of Heterogorgia Verrill, 1868 (Coelenterata, Octocorallia) from Brazil with Comments on the type Species of the Genus

The genus Heterogorgia Verrill, 1868, is poorly known. The sclerites of its type species, H. verrucosa Verrill, 1868, were never well figured and several species were later erroneously added to the genus. The present paper describes a new species, H. uatumani, from southeastern Brazil, first record of the genus in the Atlantic. Also, it illustrates the sclerites of syntypes of H. verrucosa using scanning electron micrographs to demonstrate the taxonomic characteristics that delimit this genus. H. tortuosa Verrill, 1868, is considered a new synonym of H. verrucosa. Although very similar in colonial form and spicular characters, H. verrucosa and H. uatumani n. sp. differ mainly in the arrangement of sclerites in the crown: lacking sclerites below the collaret in the new species and with converging sclerites below the collaret, merging it with the calyx margin, in H. verrucosa. The sclerites of the new species are also illustrated using scanning micrographs.