Species-Specific and Ontogenetic Sensor Charateristics of Marine Planktonic Copedpods

9415791 Paffenhofer该项目的长期目标是识别、描述和量化控制海洋浮游动物丰度、组成和分布的关键过程。一般的假设是，信号感知和对信号的反应能力决定了喂食者/捕食者是否捕获食物/猎物，或者猎物是否避开或逃离捕食者。这个项目的想法是由（a）关于桡足类感官表现的文章和（B）正在进行的猎物和捕食者行为研究的结果引发的。除了物种之间的主要差异外，先前的工作表明物种内发育阶段之间存在一系列从小到大的差异。仅观察行为不足以描述一个阶段或物种感知和捕获食物以及感知和避免捕食者的能力范围。这些观察结果必须与生物体的感官生理学信息相结合。因此，本项目将研究：（a）五种丰富的海洋浮游桡足类的无节幼体、早期桡足类阶段和成年雌性的头部附肢上化学和机械传感器的丰度和分布;（B）利用通过（a）获得的数据，研究两种传感器类型的丰度和分布的个体发育变化。该项目将利用激光扫描共聚焦显微镜（LSCM）来描述传感器的分布和方向在3-D（较大规模）和传感器类型（较小规模）和透射电子显微镜（TEM），以获得超微结构信息的主要传感器类型的确认LSCM的观察。拟议研究的意义在于提高我们对丰富的桡足类物种的发育阶段和成年雌性可以感知到什么以及它们不能感知到什么的了解。对食物和捕食者的感知对所有种类的浮游桡足类的生存至关重要。从静态数据中合并数据（结构）与动态（行为）观察的结果应大于两者的总和：粗桡足类形态学相关信息（例如附肢大小）与摄食行为、运动行为传感器丰度和分布以及传感器个体发育变化的信息相结合，应有助于我们理解（a）某些桡足类物种和阶段如何以及为什么能在各自的环境中存在，以及（B）它们如何可能是遗传学上相关的。***

9415791 Paffenhofer The long term goal of this project is to identify, describe and quantify key processes which govern the abundance, composition and distribution of zooplankton in the ocean. The general hypothesis, is that both, signal perception and the ability to respond to signals determine if a feeder/predator captures food/prey, or if the prey avoids or escapes from the predator. The ideas for this project were triggered by (a) articles on sensory performance of copepods, and (b) results from ongoing studies of behavior of prey and predators. In addition to major differences between species, prior work has indicated a range of small to major differences among developmental stages within species. Observation of behavior alone are insufficient to describe a stage's or species' range of capabilities to perceive and capture food, and to perceive and avoid predators. These observations must be coupled with information regarding the organisms' sensory physiology. Therefore, this project will examine: (a) the abundance and distribution of chemo-and mechanosensors on the cephalic appendages of nauplii, early copepodid stages, and adult females of five abundant species of marine planktonic copepods; and (b) ontogenetic changes in abundance and distribution of both sensor types using data obtained through (a). The project will utilize Laser Scanning Confocal Microscopy (LSCM) to describe the sensor distribution and orientation in 3-D (larger scale) and sensor type (smaller scale) and Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) to obtain ultrastructural information on the major sensor types as confirmation of the LSCM observations. The significance of the proposed studies lies in improving our understanding of what developmental stages and adult females of abundant copepod species can perceive and what they can not. Perception of food and predators is crucial for the existence of all species of planktonic copepods. Combining data from static (structure) an d dynamic (behavior) observation should result in more than the sum of both: relating information on coarse copepod morphology (e.g. appendage size) to information on feeding behavior, motion behavior sensor abundance and distribution, and sensor ontogenetic changes should improve our understanding (a) about how and why certain copepod species and stages can exist in their respective environments, and (b) how they may be phylogenetically related. ***