Stephanodiscus popovskayae, a new species from the volcanic lakes of Kamchatka in East Asia, Russia

Abstract

During phytoplankton studies of the volcanic lakes of Kamchatka in East Asia, Russia, a new centric diatom species was discovered, Stephanodiscus popovskayae sp. nov. Its morphology is described using light and scanning electron microscopy. Stephanodiscus popovskayae occurs mainly in small colonies and its valve face is concentrically wavy to almost flat, with one (rarely two) central fultoportulae. Stephanodiscus popovskayae is similar to S. chantaicus Genkal & Kuzmina. The main difference is the lack of central fultoportulae in S. chantaicus.

Keywords:

• new species
• Stephanodiscus popovskayae
• volcanic lakes
• Kamchatka (Russia)

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank anonymous reviewers for the critical reading of the manuscript and their valuable suggestions, comments and a linguistic review of the paper.