Aquatic tardigrades in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, North Carolina and Tennessee, U.S.A., with the description of a new species of Thulinius (Tardigrada, Isohypsibiidae)

Researchers have identified a new species of aquatic tardigrade, Thulinius romanoi, within the Great Smoky Mountains National Park (GSMNP), adding to the park's biodiversity record. This discovery, part of the All Taxa Biodiversity Inventory, also confirmed the presence of Thulinius augusti in the U.S., previously unrecorded, and documented nine specimens of a third species, Thulinius cf. saltursus, with slight morphological variations from known records. The study employed combined morphological and molecular analysis to distinguish these species, updating the list of tardigrades in GSMNP streams to 44 species, 22 of which are predominantly or exclusively aquatic.

BERTOLANI, R., BARTELS, P. J., GUIDETTI, R., CESARI, M., & NELSON, D. R. (2014). Aquatic tardigrades in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, North Carolina and Tennessee, U.S.A., with the description of a new species of Thulinius (Tardigrada, Isohypsibiidae). Zootaxa, 3764(5). https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.3764.5.2