Anheteromeyenia
Taxonomy
This page represents the following TreeOfLife-200M taxonomic path.[1]
- Kingdom: Animalia
- Phylum: Porifera
- Class: Demospongiae
- Order: Spongillida
- Family: Spongillidae
- Genus: Anheteromeyenia
Overview
Anheteromeyenia is a genus of freshwater sponges (family Spongillidae) that have gemmules as resting stages and, in its modern genus concept, are characterized by a reduced siliceous skeleton lacking microscleres and by diagnostic gemmosclere and megasclere characters.[2]
Diagnosis (genus-level concept)
In the genus redefinition/redescription by Buso et al. (2012), species of Anheteromeyenia are recognized by a set of gemmule and spicule traits, including:
- Continental sponges without microscleres.
- Gemmosscleres that are spiny and irregularly birotulated, with rotules described either as dome-shaped/indented into hooks or, in a shorter category, reduced to an irregular circle of incurved spines.
- Two megasclere size categories: an abundant “alpha” category and a rare “beta” category (with beta megascleres near gemmules).
- A generally patchy crust habit with abundant gemmules and only a fragile/limited spongin skeleton.[2]
Distribution and habitat
Buso et al. (2012) summarize the genus as occurring in Nearctic and Neotropical regions. It is associated with both running waters (often as flat soft crusts on stones and rocky stream banks) and lentic waters (tuft-like growth over patchy groups of gemmules). The appearance can change with exposure/desiccation (e.g., greener when exposed; glassy/silvery tones with darker shadows where gemmule mounds underlie the tissue).[2]
Visual Description
The images below come from preserved specimen records attributed to Anheteromeyenia (often treated at species level in museum datasets).
- Specimen image (museum record): Anheteromeyenia argyrosperma (preserved specimen; museum record).[3]
(Dataset images in this run were not readable in the workspace image loader, so the visual description section focuses on broadly consistent “freshwater spongillid” specimen-level appearance rather than fine morphological details.)
Species notes relevant to identification
Buso et al. (2012) used SEM-based morphological study to define and differentiate species within Anheteromeyenia, including key diagnostic differences in gemmule/spicule characters (e.g., whether beta megascleres occur, and differences in gemmosclere/rotule morphology).
Notably:
- Anheteromeyenia vitrea is described as extremely fragile and “glassy/bright,” forming glass-wool-like clumps around organic/support material, with no microscleres; gemmules include a conspicuous foraminal (porus) tube, and the gemmule characters support its placement in the redefined genus concept.[2]
Gallery
References
- ↑ Dataset view for Animalia / Porifera / Demospongiae / Spongillida / Spongillidae / Anheteromeyenia constructed from imageomics/TreeOfLife-200M records under this taxonomic path. Hugging Face Datasets. https://huggingface.co/datasets/imageomics/TreeOfLife-200M.
- 1 2 3 4 Antônio Álvaro Buso; Cecília Volkmer‐Ribeiro; Luiz Carlos Ruiz Pessenda; Vanessa de Souza Machado. Anheteromeyenia vitrea (Porifera: Demospongiae) new species of continental sponge in Brazil. Neotropical Biology and Conservation. 2012. https://doi.org/10.4013/nbc.2012.73.01.
- ↑ Anheteromeyenia Schröder, 1927. GBIF. https://www.gbif.org/species/2244822. Accessed 2026-07-09.