An occurence records database of Irregular Echinoids (Echinodermata: Echinoidea) in Mexico

Abstract Background Research on echinoderms in Mexico began in the late nineteenth century. We present a dataset that includes the taxonomic and geographic information of irregular echinoids from Mexico, housed in four collections: 1) Colección Nacional de Equinodermos “Ma. Elena Caso Muñoz” from the Instituto de Ciencias del Mar y Limnología (ICML), Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM); 2) Invertebrate Zoology Collection, Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C., United States of America (USA); 3) Invertebrate Collection, Museum of Comparative Zoology, University of Harvard, Boston, Massachusetts, USA and 4) Invertebrate Zoology, Peabody Museum, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA. New information A total of six orders, 17 families, 35 genera and 68 species are reported, 37 distributed in the Pacific coast and 31 in the Atlantic coast, none of them was found in both coasts. The most diverse region is the Gulf of California (S=32); the most diverse order is Spatangoida with 31 species reported in mexican waters.


Introduction
Research on echinoderms in Mexico started on 1838 with the report of Mellita hexapora in Veracruz by L. E. Agassiz and G. Valentin. During XIX century, the Challenger and Albatross expeditions collected specimens in mexican territory (Durán-González et al. 2005).
Caso published a series of monographs (Caso 1978, Caso 1980, Caso 1983) of echinoid species of the Pacific coast of Mexico, including diagnosis, synonyms, description, measurements, distribution, reports in Mexico and catalogue number for each species, as well as taxonomic keys for the order, family genus and species level. Bravo-Tzompantzi et al. 1999 reported the echinoids from Puerto Morelos, Quintana Roo, known as a diverse area for echinoderms. They present taxonomic keys, systematics, illustrations, as well as geographic and bathymetric data. Bravo-Tzompantzi et al. 2000 enlisted fossil and extant echinoid species from the Gulf of Mexico and the Mexican Caribbean Coast. This work described the problems around the economic importance and the legal aspects of using the natural resources of the Atlantic coast of Mexico. Solís-Marín et al. 2013 reported 58 species of irregular echinoids in Mexico, analyzing the fauna in different marine regions, where the Gulf of Mexico was the most diverse region of echinoids in Mexico. A revision of echinoids form the Gulf of Mexico (Laguarda-Figueras et al. 2005a) reported species collected in different oceanographic expeditions, including geographic coordinates of the reports; that revision includes taxonomic keys for the echinoids from the Gulf of Mexico as well as photographs, synonyms, diagnosis, descriptions and distribution for each species. Similar works have been published for echinoderm species reported for different marine regions in Mexico: 51 species of echinoids in Gulf of Mexico (Durán-González et al. 2005), 36 species of echinoids in the Mexican Caribbean (Laguarda-Figueras et al. 2005b) and 40 species of echinoids in the Gulf of California (Solís-Marín et al. 2005).
In this work we present a dataset that includes the taxonomic and geographic information of irregular echinoids from Mexico; this data was submitted in a parsimony analysis endemicity (Martínez-Melo et al. 2014) resulting in four biogeographic regions in the Atlantic coast and five in the Pacific coast, suggesting that the oceanic currents and sediments are the environmental factors that determine the distribution of irregular echinoids in the Mexican Atlantic coast; on the other hand, oceanic currents and depth are the environmental factors that determine the distribution of irregular echinoids in the Mexican Pacific coast.
Mexico host an important diversity of echinoderms. 643 species have been reported in mexican territory, aboout 10% of the species of echinoderms reported in the world (Solís-Marín et al. 2013). Recognizing the mexican species has been possible due to taxonomic inventories of the phylum in different coastal habitats, represeting valuable information (Solís-Marín and Laguarda-Figueras 2012). Quality control: We redetermined specimens at species level, and the species were classified under the criteria of Kroh and Smith 2010; sbspecies were included at species level. Names were verified against the Worls Register of Marine Species (WoRMS). Collection data were downloaded from the databases from 4 biologic collections (1.ICML-UNAM, 2.USNM, 3.MCZ, 4.YPM). and copied from specimens labels. Geographic data were corroborated with electronic maps by Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS).

Geographic coverage
Description: This study covers the Economic Exclusive Zone of Mexico, including both coastlines Fig. 1

Taxonomic coverage
Description: This database concerns all irregular echinoid (Echinodermata: Echinoidea: Irregularia) species inhabiting Mexico. Species are listed in Table 1, including the scientific collections where material is hosted and the marine provinces (according to Aguayo and Trápaga 1996) where the species inhabits.     The full scientific name of the kingdom in which the taxon is classified phylum

ORDER FAMILY GENUS SPECIES 1 2 3 4 I II III IV V VI
The full scientific name of the phylum or division in which the taxon is classified. class The full scientific name of the class in which the taxon is classified. order The full scientific name of the order in which the taxon is classified. family The full scientific name of the family in which the taxon is classified.

genus
The full scientific name of the genus in which the taxon is classified. specificEpithet The name of the first or species epithet of the scientificName. infraSpecificEpithet The name of the lowest or terminal infraspecific epithet of the scientificName, excluding any rank designation. taxonRank The taxonomic rank of the most specific name in the scientificName Recommended best practice is to use a controlled vocabulary.
scientificNameAuthorship The authorship information for the scientificName formatted according to the conventions of the applicable nomenclaturalCode.
nomenclaturalCode The nomenclatural code (or codes in the case of an ambiregnal name) under which the scientificName is constructed Recommended best practice is to use a controlled vocabulary.
taxonomicStatus The status of the use of the scientificName as a label for a taxon Requires taxonomic opinion to define the scope of a taxon Rules of priority then are used to define the taxonomic status of the nomenclature contained in that scope, combined with the experts opinion It must be linked to a specific taxonomic reference that defines the concept Recommended best practice is to use a controlled vocabulary.