ABSTRACT
Interest in elasmobranch biodiversity and taxonomy has grown in recent years, catalyzed primarily by four inuences: (1) the large number of new species that have been described over the past 30 years (e.g., Last and Stevens, 2009); (2) the recognition that many species of elasmobranchs, several of which have not yet been formally described, may be threatened with extinction from shing pressures and habitat destruction (Stevens et al., 2000); (3) the growing interest in DNA “barcoding” as a tool to augment taxonomic description (e.g., Ward et al., 2007); and (4) an emerging recognition of the important role that elasmobranchs play as top predators in marine ecosystems (Heithaus et al., 2008).
