Morphology, morphogenesis and molecular phylogeny of a new marine ciliate, Trichototaxis marina n. sp. (Ciliophora, Urostylida)

Xiaoteng Lu; Feng Gao; Chen Shao; Xiaozhong Hu; Alan Warren

doi:10.1016/j.ejop.2014.08.002

Morphology, morphogenesis and molecular phylogeny of a new marine ciliate, Trichototaxis marina n. sp. (Ciliophora, Urostylida)

Eur J Protistol. 2014 Oct;50(5):524-37. doi: 10.1016/j.ejop.2014.08.002. Epub 2014 Aug 23.

Authors

Xiaoteng Lu¹, Feng Gao¹, Chen Shao², Xiaozhong Hu³, Alan Warren⁴

Affiliations

¹ Laboratory of Protozoology, Institute of Evolution and Marine Biodiversity, Ocean University of China, Qingdao 266003, China.
² The Key Laboratory of Biomedical Information Engineering, Ministry of Education, School of Life Science and Technology, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an 710049, China.
³ Laboratory of Protozoology, Institute of Evolution and Marine Biodiversity, Ocean University of China, Qingdao 266003, China. Electronic address: xiaozhonghu@ouc.edu.cn.
⁴ Department of Life Sciences, Natural History Museum, London SW7 5BD, UK.

PMID: 25254329
DOI: 10.1016/j.ejop.2014.08.002

Abstract

The live morphology, infraciliature and morphogenesis of a new urostylid ciliate, Trichototaxis marina n. sp., collected from coastal water in Qingdao, China, were studied based on the observations of live and silver stained specimens. The new species is characterised as follows: body very flexible and contractile, slight to brick-reddish in colour due to irregularly-shaped, brick-red pigments; ca. 70 adoral membranelles; about 17 frontal cirri arranged in a bicorona; average 67 midventral pairs, the right base of each pair being conspicuously larger than the left base; five to seven transverse cirri; constantly two frontoterminal, one buccal and two pretransverse ventral cirri; two or three left marginal rows; right and innermost left marginal rows with 56-92 and 66-106 cirri, respectively; six bipolar dorsal kineties; more than 100 macronuclear nodules. The characteristic morphogenetic feature in T. marina is the development of the left marginal rows, that is, only one left marginal row is newly built the other one or two being retained from the parental cell. Phylogenetic analyses based on small subunit ribosomal gene sequence data reveal a close relationship of T. marina with members of family Pseudokeronopsidae.

Keywords: Infraciliature; Marine ciliates; Ontogenesis; SSU rDNA; Trichototaxis marina n. sp.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

China
Ciliophora* / classification
Ciliophora* / cytology
Ciliophora* / genetics
Morphogenesis
Phylogeny*
RNA, Ribosomal, 18S / genetics
Species Specificity

Substances

RNA, Ribosomal, 18S