Psychropotes verrucicaudatus, a new species of deep-sea holothurian (Echinodermata: Holothuroidea: Elasipodida: Psychropotidae) from a seamount in the South China Sea

A new species of psychropotid holothurian, Psychropotes verrucicaudatus sp. nov., is described from Jiaolong Seamount in the South China Sea. A single specimen was taken by a manned submersible from soft bottom at a depth of 3615 m. Psychropotes verrucicaudatus has a violet body surrounded by a brim of fused tube feet, an unpaired dorsal appendage, 16 tentacles, and two rows of midventral tube feet. Both the dorsal skin and unpaired dorsal appendage are covered with conspicuous warts. The body-wall ossicles are crosses with three or four arms, and a short, central apophysis; in addition, a giant cross is present in each wart of the dorsal skin; the tentacles ossicles are rods with spines. The new species differs from its congeners in having a very short and warty dorsal appendage. We also provide the Genbank accession numbers of partial sequences of 16S rRNA and mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit I gene. This is the first report of an elasipodid holothurian from the Jiaolong Seamount area.