Three species of Asterocheres, including two new species, are reported as associates of sponges in shallow Antarctic water. Asterocheres spinosus sp. nov. has a combination of diagnostic features: mandibular palp is one-segmented, caudal ramus is 1.88 times as long as wide, antennule is 20-segmented in the female and 18-segmented in the male, urosome is spinulose, and legs 1 and 2 display weak sexual dimorphsims. In A. rai sp. nov., the body is large, 1.66 mm long in the female, the lateral margin of genital double-somite is smooth without setules or spinules, the exopod of antenna bears only a single seta, with two mucilaginous substances transformed from setae, and the third endopodal segment of leg 1 bears a prolonged distal process. A supplementary description is given for A. hirsutus Bandera, Conradi and López-González, 2005, recorded previously from the Antarctic.

A total of seven poorly known species of the genus Asterocheres, the largest genus of the family Asterocheridae, are redescribed based on material deposited in the Natural History Museum of London. Among the material available, there were specimens of both sexes of A. bulbosus, A. ellisi and A. rotundus; the dissected holotypes for A. hongkongensis, A. indicus and A. ovalis which have no other specimens; and only cotype of A. micheli, turned out to be lost. Some taxonomically important appendages of these species are described and illustrated for the first time. Furthermore, discrepancies have been observed in: (1) the general shape of the body; (2) the antennule segmentation; (3) the omission of some elements in various oral appendages; and (4) the segmentation of the mandibular palp. These redescribed species were then compared with their closest congeners.