1. New crustaceans from the deep waters of the Great Australian Bight and their rapid documentation using the Scratchpad platform By Dr Genefor Walker-Smith 1, Dr Kelly Merrin 1, Dr Hugh MacIntosh 1, Dr Robin Wilson 1, Dr Alan Williams 2 1 Museum Victoria, Sciences – Marine Invertebrates, GPO Box 666, Melbourne VIC 3001; 2 CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research, Castray Esplanade, Hobart, TAS 7001

2. INTRODUCTION & AIMS – The Benthic Biodiversity Project The Great Australian Bight (GAB) Research Program is a large collaboration between industry, government and universities. Within this program is the Benthic Biodiversity Project. The three main aims of this project were: 1. To describe the composition, abundance and distribution of benthic fauna in the deep waters of the GAB. 2. To collect baseline information for future ecological monitoring. 3. To contribute data to ecosystem models. This project represents the first systematic, wide-ranging collection of macrofaunal invertebrates in the deep GAB. This presentation will focus on the first aim of the Benthic Biodiversity Project; in particular the crustacean diversity, and its rapid documentation using the “Scratchpad – biodiversity online” platform (http://scratchpads.eu/)http://scratchpads.eu/

3. METHODS Benthic infauna were collected using a multi-corer deployed from the RV Southern Surveyor. Samples were taken at five depths: 200, 400, 1000, 1500 and 2000 m. Samples were rough sorted in the labs at SARDI, then sent to Museum Victoria for identification to the species level.

4. Core samples produced 372 macroinvertebrate specimens: 44.6% were crustaceans 47.6% of the crustacean species were amphipods Isopods represented the second most diverse crustacean group The amphipod fauna contained 18 families and 37 species There were 9 families and 16 species of isopods RESULTS 93% of the amphipods and 94% of the isopods were new, undescribed species.

5. RESULTS – the Scratchpad An historic problem with large-scale surveys has been the timely dissemination of taxonomic information and the capability to check species identifications. We chose the Scratchpad biodiversity on-line platform as a way of rapidly publishing images, illustrations, descriptions and habitat data related to the invertebrate species found in the Great Australian Bight.

6. More Information Author contact details: gwalker@museum.vic.gov.au or hmacintosh@museum.vic.gov.au Great Australian Bight Benthic Invertebrate Scratchpad: http://gab.myspecies.info/ Great Australian Bight Benthic Invertebrate Scratchpad: http://gab.myspecies.info/ For more information on the GAB research program go to: http://www.misa.net.au/GAB For more information on the GAB research program go to: http://www.misa.net.au/GAB Scratchpads – biodiversity online: http://scratchpads.eu/ Scratchpads – biodiversity online: http://scratchpads.eu/ Acknowledgements. Other collaborators on this project were: Franziska Althaus (CSIRO Ocean and Atmosphere Flagship); Leonardo Mantilla, Maylene Loo, Shirley Sorokin and Jason Tanner (SARDI – responsible for rough sorting), Dr Anna McCallum (Decapoda identification). Background photo: Great Australian Bight Marine Park by Nachoman-au Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Great_Australian_Bight_Marine_Park.jpg#/media/File:Great_Australian_Bight_Marine _Park.jpg