Asterias forbesi Asterias forbesi Asterias forbesi, commonly known as Forbes sea star, is a species of starfish in the family Asteriidae. It is found in shallow waters in the northwest Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea. "Asterias forbesi" usually has 5 arms but occasionally has 4 or 6. Like many starfish species, the upper surface is covered in blunt conical projections giving it a rough feel. Some of these are pedicellariae, minute pincers that can grip objects. The arms are plump, broad at the base and tapering to a blunt tip. This starfish grows to about in diameter with an arm length
Starfish argument. In 2011, on further molecular evidence, Janies and colleagues noted that the phylogeny of the echinoderms "has proven difficult", and that "the overall phylogeny of extant echinoderms remains sensitive to the choice of analytical methods". They presented a phylogenetic tree for the living Asteroidea only; using the traditional names of starfish orders where possible, and indicating "part of" otherwise, the phylogeny is shown below. The Solasteridae are split from the Velatida, and the old Spinulosida is broken up. Starfish are deuterostomes, closely related, together with all other echinoderms, to chordates, and are used in reproductive and developmental studies. Female