76 (1): 1 – 30 14.5.2018 © Senckenberg Gesellschaft für Naturforschung, 2018. Relationships of the Sphaeromatidae genera (Peracarida: Isopoda) inferred from 18S rDNA and 16S rDNA genes Regina Wetzer *, 1, Niel L. Bruce 2 & Marcos Pérez-Losada 3, 4, 5 1 Research and Collections, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, 900 Exposition Boulevard, Los Angeles, California 90007 USA; Regina Wetzer * [
[email protected]] — 2 Museum of Tropical Queensland, 70–102 Flinders Street, Townsville, 4810 Australia; Water Research Group, Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management, North-West University, Private Bag X6001, Potchefstroom 2520, South Africa; Niel L. Bruce [
[email protected]] — 3 Computation Biology Institute, Milken Institute School of Public Health, The George Washington University, Ashburn, VA 20148, USA; Marcos Pérez-Losada [mlosada @gwu.edu] — 4 CIBIO-InBIO, Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos, Universidade do Porto, Campus Agrário de Vairão, 4485-661 Vairão, Portugal — 5 Department of Invertebrate Zoology, US National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC 20013, USA — * Corresponding author Accepted 13.x.2017. Published online at www.senckenberg.de/arthropod-systematics on 30.iv.2018. Editors in charge: Stefan Richter & Klaus-Dieter Klass Abstract. The Sphaeromatidae has 100 genera and close to 700 species with a worldwide distribution. Most are abundant primarily in shallow (< 200 m) marine communities, but extend to 1.400 m, and are occasionally present in permanent freshwater habitats. They play an important role as prey for epibenthic fishes and are commensals and scavengers. Sphaeromatids’ impressive exploitation of diverse habitats, in combination with diversity in female life history strategies and elaborate male combat structures, has resulted in extraordinary levels of homoplasy.