A chemosynthetic weed: the tubeworm Sclerolinum contortum is a bipolar, cosmopolitan species

BMC Evolutionary Biology

Research Article

Mari H. Eilertsen¹  Adrian G. Glover²  Helena Wiklund²  Magdalena N. Georgieva³  James B. Bell⁴  Rachel A. Mills⁵  Crispin T. S. Little⁶ 

[1] Centre for Geobiology, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway;Department of Biology, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway;Life Sciences Department, Natural History Museum, London, UK;Life Sciences Department, Natural History Museum, London, UK;School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK;Life Sciences Department, Natural History Museum, London, UK;School of Geography, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK;Ocean and Earth Science, National Oceanography Centre Southampton, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK;School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK;

关键词: Siboglinidae;    Polychaeta;    Annelida;    Antarctica;    Gene flow;    Deep-sea;    Connectivity;    Hydrothermal vent;    Cold seep;    Biogeography;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12862-015-0559-y

 received in 2015-10-07, accepted in 2015-12-06,  发布年份 2015

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundSclerolinum (Annelida: Siboglinidae) is a genus of small, wiry deep-sea tubeworms that depend on an endosymbiosis with chemosynthetic bacteria for their nutrition, notable for their ability to colonise a multitude of reducing environments. Since the early 2000s, a Sclerolinum population has been known to inhabit sediment-hosted hydrothermal vents within the Bransfield Strait, Southern Ocean, and whilst remaining undescribed, it has been suggested to play an important ecological role in this ecosystem. Here, we show that the Southern Ocean Sclerolinum population is not a new species, but more remarkably in fact belongs to the species S. contortum, first described from an Arctic mud volcano located nearly 16,000 km away.ResultsOur new data coupled with existing genetic studies extend the range of this species across both polar oceans and the Gulf of Mexico. Our analyses show that the populations of this species are structured on a regional scale, with greater genetic differentiation occurring between rather than within populations. Further details of the external morphology and tube structure of S. contortum are revealed through confocal and SEM imaging, and the ecology of this worm is discussed.ConclusionsThese results shed further insight into the plasticity and adaptability of this siboglinid group to a range of reducing conditions, and into the levels of gene flow that occur between populations of the same species over a global extent.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© Georgieva et al. 2015