.......................................................................................................................................... ii Acknowledgments.......................................................................................................................... iii List of Figures ................................................................................................................................ ix List of Tables ................................................................................................................................ xii Chapter 1: Introduction to Dissertation ..........................................................................................1 1.1 General introduction and background on Antarctic biology, Asteroidea, taxonomic history of Odontasteridae ............................................................................1 1.2 Research Objectives .....................................................................................................5 1.3 References ....................................................................................................................7 Chapter 2: Combined morphological and molecular phylogeny of Odontasteridae ....................14 2.1 Abstract ......................................................................................................................14 2.2 Introduction ................................................................................................................14 2.3 Materials and methods ................................................................................................17 2.3.1 Specimen collection ............................................................................................17 2.3.2 Molecular data ....................................................................................................17 2.3.2 Morphological data .............................................................................................18 2.4 Results ........................................................................................................................20 2.4.1 Morphological character analysis if Odontasteridae ...........................................21 2.1.2 Systematics .........................................................................................................26 2.5 Discussion ..................................................................................................................27