Genetic description of Manania handi and Manania gwilliami

Abstract

Staurozoa is an intriguing lineage of cnidarians bearing both polypoid and medusoid characters in the adult body plan. Miranda et al. (2016) provided a massive descriptive effort of specimen collection, sequencing, and character evolution. We also recently described the neuromusculature of two staurozoan species: Manania handi and Haliclystus \"sanjuanensis.\" We found that our M. handi samples genetically matched Manania gwilliami samples used in Miranda et al. (2016). Taking advantage of newly-deposited M. gwilliami sequence data, we confirm the identity of our M. handi samples, and provide additional sequence data for M. handi and H. sanjuanensis for future staurozoan identification efforts.