Published in Microbial Ecology
Vibrios are among the most abundant culturable microbes in aquatic environments. They can be either free-living in the water column or associated with several marine organisms as mutualists, saprophytes, or parasites. In the present study we analysed vibrios abundance and diversity in the mucus of the polychaete Myxicola infundibulum, complementing...
Published in Cytotechnology
Hemocytes constitute the key element of innate immunity in bivalves, being responsible for secretion of antimicrobial peptides and release of zymogens from the prophenoloxidase system within the hemolymph compartment, reactive oxygen species production and phagocytosis. Hemocytes are found (and collected) as cells in suspension in circulating hemol...
Published in Marine Biology
In the present study, the hypothesis that marine nudibranch mollusks harbor symbiotic bacteria was tested using analyses of fatty acids as biochemical markers and transmission electron microscopy of the tissues of Dendrodoris nigra (Gastropoda/Opisthobranchia/Nudibranchia). An aberrant level of the odd-numbered carbon chain and branched fatty acids...
Published in Current Microbiology
Marine organisms represent approximately half of the world’s biodiversity by virtue of the sea being an immense reservoir of bioactive molecules. Here, antimicrobial crude extract activities of different marine invertebrates from the Caribbean Sea were evaluated. One of the most active, crude extracts was that marine snail Cenchritis muricatus, it ...
Published in Chemistry of Natural Compounds
Published in BMC Evolutionary Biology
BackgroundRare species have seldom been studied in marine habitats, mainly because it is difficult to formally assess the status of rare species, especially in patchy benthic organisms, for which samplings are often assumed to be incomplete and, thus, inappropriate for establishing the real abundance of the species. However, many marine benthic inv...
Published in Marine Biology
Many studies have examined latitudinal differences in reproduction of marine invertebrates, but few have measured variation at small to intermediate scales (kilometres to hundreds of kilometres), which may confound comparisons across broader geographic regions. Here, we examined variation in the reproductive biology of a little-studied species of b...
Published in Marine Biology
Offspring size can have pervasive effects throughout the life history stages of many marine invertebrates. Although maternal offspring investment is largely determined by the environmental conditions experienced by the mother, egg size might additionally vary in response to the number and quality of previous mating partners. Positive effects of mat...
Published in Journal of Evolutionary Biochemistry and Physiology
Mechanisms of generation of reactive oxygen forms (ROF) by external surfaces of marine sponges Sycon sp. and actiniae Aiptasia pulchella were studied. Activities of enzymes participating in production (myeloperoxidase, xanthine oxidase) and inactivation (superoxide dismutase, catalase) of ROF were measured. Effects of action of different chemical s...
Published in Estuaries
Emerging insects were monitored every 10 days between early May and late August 1993, from tidal pools in three coastal salt marshes on Prince Edward Island, Canada. The salt marsh pools ranged from about 1 m2 to > 1,000 m2 in surface area, and had salinities ranging from 11–27‰ Water temperatures through the study period ranged from 4–46°C. Most o...
