Two Italian scientists identified one New species of molluska sea snail, thanks to the project ‘Skerki mission‘ from the Fundación oceanogràfra de valencia (Spain). It hasn’t happened for 200 years. Good news for the biodiversity?
The mollusk just discovered in the waters of our central Mediterranean is a gastropod, a sea snail, described for the first time a Skerki From two Italian brothers, Andrea and Marco Spinelli, respectively marine and documentary biologist.
The project
The study of biodiversity of Skerkian almost unexplored area of the Mediterranean Sea, began about two years ago, from the idea of the Spinelli brothers, who, together with a team of marine biologists, researchers, documentarists and archaeologists, have sailed in the heart of the Mediterranean, about 70 marine miles from the Italian coast.
Here stands the underwater mountain range of Skerkifrom a depth of about 400 meters to the surface of the sea, in the zero point known as’Scoglio Keith‘, covering an area of over 500 square km.
Banco Skerki probably represents theonly uncontaminated corner of our sea nostrum, preserved in a completely natural way – reads the official press release – this Paradise of biodiversity It is supervised exclusively by currents and waves, located off the coast of Sicily
Precisely for this reason, scientists have chosen these places for investigations and, during the scientific shipments of 2023 and 2024, they immersed themselves in its waters by collecting champions of the area and documenting the species that live in its seabed.
The discovery
And it is precisely here that he realizes that, among the numerous species already known, one lived one probably still unknown. In fact, during laboratory analyzes, this has been identified as a new species of mollusk: it is Steromphala federiciiia small snail probably endemic by Skerki, a species that lives only in this area of the Mediterranean Sea.
At the moment we know that he lives in areas skillfully in some caves, where it was found, and that it measures no more than a few millimeters. But above all we know that the species reproduces in the area, given that both adult and young examples have been found.
Because the discovery is so important
As scientists explain, the last kind of mollusk of the genre Rush had been described in the Mediterranean in 1853, so I am Almost 200 years old.
The discovery of a new species in the 21st century is proof of how much there is still to learn about our Mediterranean Sea – explains Andrea Spinelli – the vast biodiversity of remote areas like Skerki continues to keep priceless secrets for science and conservation
Treasures and secrets – we add – that we must however protect, do not continue to destroy and plunder.
The specimens studied of the new species are kept at the National Museum of Natural Sciences of MadridThe Regional Museum of Natural Sciences of TurintheUniversity of Messina and the Fundación oceanogràfra de valenciaand the work was published on Biodiversity Journal.
Sources: Fundación Oceanogràfra de Valencia / Biodiversity Journal
