Taxonomic descriptions of two marine ciliates, Euplotes dammamensis n. sp. and Euplotes balteatus (Dujardin, 1841) Kahl, 1932 (Ciliophora, Spirotrichea, Euplotida), collected from the Arabian Gulf, Saudi Arabia

The morphology, morphogenesis and infraciliature of two marine euplotid ciliates, Euplotes dammamensis n. sp. and Euplotes balteatus (Dujardin, 1841) Kahl, 1932, isolated from a sandy beach of the Arabian Gulf, Saudi Arabia, were investigated using observations in vivo and protargol-impregnation methods. Euplotes dammamensis n. sp. is characterized by a combination of features including its huge body size (100-170 × 80-120 μm), 10 conspicuous dorsal ridges, 10 normal-sized frontoventral and two marginal cirri, and 11 dorsal kineties. Euplotes balteatus is mainly characterized by 10 frontoventral, two caudal, and two left marginal cirri, 7-10 dorsal kineties and 5-7 prominent dorsal ridges as well as double-eurystomus silverline system. The small subunit rRNA (SSU-rRNA) gene sequences were determined for both species and phylogenetic analyses based on these data indicated that E. dammamensis is most closely related to E. parabalteatus Jiang et al., 2010, and E. balteatus clusters with E. plicatum Valbonesi et al., 1997, E. orientalis Jiang et al., 2010, and E. bisulcatus Kahl, 1932.