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Barbel without filaments at base of stem; no filaments along stem until terminal bulb; terminal bulb varying from plump and about three times as long as wide to slender and about ten times as long as wide, without or with a variable number of short filaments.
Photophores in ventral row between pectoral and pelvic-fin insertions (PV) 45 or more; in lateral row to before pelvic insertion (OV) 43 or more. Color of head and body black.
Specimens attributed to this species taken between 45° and 50° N between Ireland and the Azores. Elsewhere, southward from Canaries to about 25° S and off South Africa; north-western Atlantic range not well known, but including Bermuda; reported from northwestern Pacific.
Meso- to bathpelagic.
Gibbs RH, Jr. 1984. Melanostomiidae. In: Whitehead PJP, Bauchot M-L, Hureau J-C, Nielsen J, Tortonese E, editors. Fishes of the North-eastern Atlantic and the Mediterranean. Paris: UNESCO. p 341–365.
Body long, slender, its depth more than 10 times into SL. Head with short, blunt shout; lower jaw not longer than upper jaw, not curved strongly upward. Pectoral-fin rays 9-11, all about equal in length, unbranched distally, and without lumps of luminescent tissue; pelvic fins low on body, their insertaion close together near ventral midline; bases of dorsal and anal fins about equal in length, their origins approximately opposed; no dorsal adipose fin. Photophores in ventral row between pectoral- and pelvic-fin inseration (PV) 40–47; no pale loop or line on flanks; postorbital photophore small and round, leass than half eye daimater; no anterior orbital photophorel; no luminescent patches of tissue behind eye.
To 32.5 cm.
View type description here.
North Atlantic.
Syntypes: BMNH 1929.7.6.11; ZMUC P201998.
