''Iphinopsis boucheti'' is a species of

sea snail Sea snail is a common name for slow-moving marine gastropod molluscs, usually with visible external shells, such as whelk or abalone. They share the taxonomic class Gastropoda with slugs, which are distinguished from snails primarily by the ...

, a marine

gastropod The gastropods (), commonly known as snails and slugs, belong to a large taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda (). This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, from freshwater, and from land. T ...

mollusk in the family

Cancellariidae Cancellariidae, common name the nutmeg snails or nutmeg shells, are a family of small to medium-large sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks in the clade Neogastropoda. Some of the shells of the species in this family resemble a nutmeg seed. Di ...

, the nutmeg snails. The specific name ''boucheti'' is in honor of French malacologist

Philippe Bouchet Philippe Bouchet (born 1953) is a French biologist whose primary scientific fields of study are malacology (the study of molluscs) and taxonomy. He works at the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris. He is also a Commissioner of the ...

Distribution

Central Indian Ridge hydrothermal vents map

The type locality is the Kairei hydrothermal vent site on the

Central Indian Ridge The Central Indian Ridge (CIR) is a north–south-trending mid-ocean ridge in the western Indian Ocean. Geological setting The morphology of the CIR is characteristic of slow to intermediate ridges. The axial valley is 500–1000 m deep; ...

, just north of the

Rodrigues Triple Point The Rodrigues Triple Junction (RTJ), also known as the Central Indian ceanTriple Junction (CITJ) is a geologic triple junction in the southern Indian Ocean where three tectonic plates meet: the African Plate, the Indo-Australian Plate, and the An ...

. It occurs in a distinct microhabitat of black smokers and sites of diffuse venting at a depth of 2424 to 2443 meters.

Description

Threats

Vent fields in the Indian Ocean seabed are of particular interest for exploration of polymetallic sulfide mineral resources. An exploration-phase license for the Triple Point region was granted by the International Seabed Authority (ISA) to the Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources of Germany under a 15-year contract, expiring in 2030. The license permits the extraction of mineral resources for technological and geological exploration purposes, yet even such restricted disturbances possess direct and indirect concerns to subpopulations of Iphinopsis boucheti. Habitat destruction through mineral extraction and the spread of sediment plumes from the agitation of vent fields and adjacent deposits have been cited as potential threats to this species.

References

Cancellariidae Gastropods described in 2004 {{cancellariidae-stub