Pseudocerotidae

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Pseudocerotidae is a family of flatworms which includes the Bedford's flatworm. Pseudocerotidae are simple organisms categorized by their oval bodies and tentacles [1] and bright colors. They use the cilia to glide along surfaces. [2] Most commonly referred to as marine flatworms, closely related to the orders Macrostomorpha and Lecithoepitheliata. These organisms have very complex reproductive systems, [3] no blood systems or organs for gas exchange, a simple brain and are hermaphroditic. [4]

Contents

Pseudocerotidae
Pseudobiceros hancockanus.jpg
Pseudobiceros hancockanus This image shows a species of marine flatworm showing prominent False Horns.
Scientific classification Red Pencil Icon.png
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Platyhelminthes
Order: Polycladida
Suborder: Cotylea
Family: Pseudocerotidae
Lang, 1884
Genera

Habitat

Coral reefs are common habitats for many species of pseudocerotidae. Coral Outcrop Flynn Reef.jpg
Coral reefs are common habitats for many species of pseudocerotidae.

Due to the anthropogenic transportation of non-native marine species, their species can be found all around the world in tropical and subtropical waters near coral reefs, [11] shallow reefs, deep waters, water surfaces and in aquaculture areas. [12] The most biodiverse areas with these species are the Caribbean and Indo-Pacific regions. [13]

Diet

The feeding methods of pseudocerotidae are most intriguing, due to their soft bodies and slow movements they must prey on other organisms with little to no movement. This is why their diet is composed of scavenging for various sponges, other stationary or dead invertebrates. They use their sensory detectors to chemically sense their food. The food is digested before entering the body. Then the food travels through their pharynx, "...which can then grow to be the size of the whole flatworm". [14]

Phenology

Pseudoceros dimidiatus- Marine flatworm using cilia to crawl along a surface. Pseudocerotidae - Pseudoceros dimidiatus.JPG
Pseudoceros dimidiatus- Marine flatworm using cilia to crawl along a surface.

Polycladia are typically distinguished by their hermaphroditic reproductive system and their external anatomy such as their eyespot arrangement, pharynx and tentacles. [12] In an experiment Pseudoceros and Pseudobiceros were previously based on their reproductive systems, the two groups of Pseudocerotidae were divided into groups through their genetic difference. A difference in an expansive segment of 28S rDNA, showed small genetic difference in the species Pseudoceros bifurcus. [15]

Reproduction

Penis fencing is not purely for reproduction and is not an aggressive battle of insemination, it is a mating ritual that can result in insemination of both individuals willfully. A few species show long term care for their young, this care is typically shown in species that have smaller offspring sizes. While larger offspring sizes with faster development in species cause little care for the young after birth. The egg capsules produced are most commonly smooth and round, except for a few species where they have pointed opercula. [16] Egg capsules can reach thousands, in a study the number of eggs for two different flatworms were 1,307 and 3,073. [17]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Flatworm</span> Phylum of soft-bodied invertebrates known as flatworms

The flatworms, flat worms, Platyhelminthes, or platyhelminths are a phylum of relatively simple bilaterian, unsegmented, soft-bodied invertebrates. Unlike other bilaterians, they are acoelomates, and have no specialized circulatory and respiratory organs, which restricts them to having flattened shapes that allow oxygen and nutrients to pass through their bodies by diffusion. The digestive cavity has only one opening for both ingestion and egestion ; as a result, the food cannot be processed continuously.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Turbellaria</span> Class of flatworms

The Turbellaria are one of the traditional sub-divisions of the phylum Platyhelminthes (flatworms), and include all the sub-groups that are not exclusively parasitic. There are about 4,500 species, which range from 1 mm (0.039 in) to large freshwater forms more than 500 mm (20 in) long or terrestrial species like Bipalium kewense which can reach 600 mm (24 in) in length. All the larger forms are flat with ribbon-like or leaf-like shapes, since their lack of respiratory and circulatory systems means that they have to rely on diffusion for internal transport of metabolites. However, many of the smaller forms are round in cross section. Most are predators, and all live in water or in moist terrestrial environments. Most forms reproduce sexually and with few exceptions all are simultaneous hermaphrodites.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Monogenea</span> Class of ectoparasitic flatworms

Monogeneans are a group of ectoparasitic flatworms commonly found on the skin, gills, or fins of fish. They have a direct lifecycle and do not require an intermediate host. Adults are hermaphrodites, meaning they have both male and female reproductive structures.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Acoelomorpha</span> Phylum of marine, flatworm-like animals

Acoelomorpha is a subphylum of very simple and small soft-bodied animals with planula-like features which live in marine or brackish waters. They usually live between grains of sediment, swimming as plankton, or crawling on other organisms, such as algae and corals. With the exception of two acoel freshwater species, all known Acoelomorphs are marine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Polycladida</span> Order of free-living marine flatworms

The Polycladida represents a highly diverse clade of free-living marine flatworms. They are known from the littoral to the sublittoral zone, and many species are common from coral reefs. Only a few species are found in freshwater habitats.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Penis fencing</span> Mating ritual in hermaphroditic flatworms

Penis fencing is a mating behavior engaged in by many species of flatworm, such as Pseudobiceros hancockanus. Species which engage in the practice are hermaphroditic; each individual has both egg-producing ovaries and sperm-producing testes.

<i>Pseudoceros</i> Genus of flatworms

Pseudoceros is a genus of the flatworms Platyhelminthes.

<i>Pseudobiceros</i> Genus of flatworms

Pseudobiceros is a genus of flatworms. Like all flatworms, Pseudobiceros are hermaphrodites. This particular genus engages in penis fencing. When the "winner" touches its penis to the "skin" of the other, insemination occurs, and the "loser" has to bear the burden of motherhood.

<i>Pseudoceros dimidiatus</i> Species of flatworm

Pseudoceros dimidiatus, the divided flatworm or tiger flatworm, is a species of flatworm in the genus Pseudoceros, belonging to the family Pseudocerotidae.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pseudoceros liparus</span> Species of flatworm

Pseudoceros bifurcus is a marine flatworm species that belongs to the family Pseudocerotidae.

<i>Pseudoceros ferrugineus</i> Species of flatworm

Pseudoceros ferrugineus, the Fuchsia flatworm, is a marine flatworm species that belongs to the Pseudocerotidae family.

Pseudoceros goslineri, the Gosliner flatworm, is a marine flatworm species that belongs to the family Pseudocerotidae.

<i>Pseudoceros lindae</i> Species of flatworm

Pseudoceros lindae, common name Linda's flatworm, is a marine Flatworm species that belongs to the Pseudocerotidae family.

<i>Pseudoceros monostichos</i> Species of flatworm

Pseudoceros monostichos is a marine flatworm species that belongs to the Pseudocerotidae family.

Pseudoceros scriptus is a marine flatworm species that belongs to the Pseudocerotidae family. This species is commonly known as the script flatworm.

<i>Thysanozoon nigropapillosum</i> Species of flatworm

Thysanozoon nigropapillosum is a species of polyclad flatworms belonging to the family Pseudocerotidae. Some common names include gold-speckled flatworm, marine flatworm, yellow papillae flatworm, yellow-spotted flatworm, and yellow-spotted polyclad flatworm.

<i>Pseudoceros susanae</i> Species of flatworm

Pseudoceros susanae is a marine flatworm species that belongs to the Pseudocerotidae family.

Diana Marcela Bolaños Rodríguez is a marine biologist from Colombia, who has studied and classified various types of platyhelminths. She was a recipient of the L'Oréal-UNESCO Fellowship for Women in Science in 2010, was selected as Colombian biologist of the year in 2012, and in 2013 was named by the BBC as one of the top ten women in science in Latin America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trepaxonemata</span> Subclass of flatworms

Trepaxonemata is a subclass of the Platyhelminthes or flatworms. It includes all parasitic flatworms and several free-living species that were previously grouped in the now obsolete class Turbellaria. Therefore, it contains the majority of species in the phylum Platyhelminthes, excluding the Catenulida, and the Macrostomorpha.

Pseudoceros canadensis is a species of free-living, flatworm in the genus Pseudoceros, belonging to the family Pseudocerotidae.

References

  1. ↑ "Family Pseudocerotidae". Marine Species Identification Portal.
  2. ↑ "Pseudocerotidae" at the Encyclopedia of Life
  3. ↑ "Phylum Platyhelminthes - flatworms". Stanford SeaNet.
  4. ↑ Ramel, Gordon (18 February 2020). "Turbellaria: Tiny, Non-Parasitic Flatworms Including Acoela & Tricladida". EarthLife.net.[ self-published source? ]
  5. ↑ Collingwood, Dr. (July 1876). "VI. On thirty-one Species of Marine Planarians, collected partly by the late Dr. Kelaart, F.L.S., at Trincomalee, and partly by Dr. Collingwood, F.L.S., in the Eastern Seas". Transactions of the Linnean Society of London. 2nd Series: Zoology. 1 (3): 83–98. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1876.tb00435.x.
  6. ↑ Newman, Leslie J.; Cannon, Lester R. G. (1996). "Bulaceros, new genus, and Tytthosoceros, new genus (Platyhelminthes: Polycladida) from the Great Barrier Reef, Australia and Papua New Guinea" (PDF). Raffles Bulletin of Zoology. 44 (2): 479–492. Retrieved 11 April 2020.
  7. 1 2 Newman, Leslie J.; Cannon, Lester R. G. (1996). "New genera of pseudocerotid flatworms (Platyhelminthes; Polycladida) from Australian and Papua New Guinean coral reefs". Journal of Natural History. 30 (10): 1425–1441. doi:10.1080/00222939600770811.
  8. 1 2 Faubel, A. (1984). "The Polycladida, Turbellaria; Proposal and establishment of a new system. Part 2. The Cotylea". Mitteilungen aus dem Hamburgischen Zoologischen Museum und Institut. 81: 189–259. NAID   10010536160.
  9. ↑ Hyman, Libbie H. (1959). "A further study of Micronesian polyclad flatworms". Proceedings of the United States National Museum. 108 (3410): 543–597. doi:10.5479/si.00963801.108-3410.543.
  10. 1 2 Lang, A (1884). "Die Polycladen des Golfes von Neapel und der angrenzenden Meeresabschnitte. Eine Monographie". Fauna und Flora des Golfes von Neapel, Leipzieg. 11. Retrieved 11 April 2020.
  11. ↑ Khalili, Zahra; Rahimian, Hassan; Pazooki, Jamile (28 December 2009). "First record of the family Pseudocerotidae (Platyhelminthes, Polycladida, Cotylea) from the Persian Gulf, Iran". ZooKeys (31): 39–51. doi: 10.3897/zookeys.31.136 .
  12. 1 2 Dixit, Sudhanshu; Bulnes, Verónica N.; Raghunathan, Chelladurai (27 September 2018). "Neotype Designation for the Marine Flatworm, Acanthozoon alderi(Polycladida: Cotylea: Pseudocerotidae), from India with Comments on theTaxonomical Status of the Genus". Zoological Studies. 57: e45. doi:10.6620/ZS.2018.57-45. PMC   6517738 . PMID   31966285.
  13. ↑ Dixit, Sudhanshu; Manjebrayakath, Hashim; Saravanane, Narayanane (March 2021). "Two new Pseudoceros (Platyhelminthes: Polycladida: Pseudocerotidae) from Agatti Island, India and a species checklist from Indian waters". Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom. 101 (2): 253–263. doi:10.1017/S0025315421000151. S2CID   233691686.
  14. ↑ "Pseudoceros Bifurcus".[ dead link ]
  15. ↑ Litvaitis, M. K.; Newman, L. J. (2001). "A molecular framework for the phylogeny of the Pseudocerotidae (Platyhelminthes, Polycladida)". Hydrobiologia. 444 (1/3): 177–182. doi:10.1023/A:1017503124908. S2CID   21562766.
  16. ↑ Tong, Samantha Jia Wen; Ong, Rene S.L. (June 2020). "Mating behavior, spawning, parental care, and embryonic development of some marine pseudocerotid flatworms (Platyhelminthes: Rhabditophora: Polycladida) in Singapore". Invertebrate Biology. 139 (2). doi:10.1111/ivb.12293. S2CID   225782903.
  17. ↑ Chim, C. K.; Ong, Rene SL; Gan, B. Q. (2015). "Penis fencing, spawning, parental care and embryonic development in the cotylean flatworm Pseudoceros indicus (Platyhelminthes: Polycladida: Pseudocerotidae) from Singapore" (PDF). Raffles Bulletin of Zoology.


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