著者

Hiroshi Ueda Hiroshi Itoh Junya Hirai Kiyotaka Hidaka

出版者

The Plankton Society of Japan, The Japanese Association of Benthology

雑誌

Plankton and Benthos Research (ISSN:18808247)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.17, no.2, pp.221-230, 2022-05-30 (Released:2022-05-31)

参考文献数

22

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The Paracalanus parvus (Claus, 1863) species complex is a common marine calanoid copepod found in the world’s oceans. Recent genetic analyses of its specimens from the world oceans revealed that the complex in the western North Pacific consists of three species, i.e., P. indicus Wolfenden, 1905, P. tropicus Andronov, 1977 and an undescribed species. We assign the last one to be Paracalanus orientalis n. sp. by comparing it with previous morphological descriptions of related species. Both sexes of the new species are fully described based on genetically identified specimens from the surface layer of the south of Japan. The new species can be reliably distinguished from P. indicus and P. tropicus by the hunchback shape of the female if it is clearly present. Among the three species, the high length:width ratio of the third exopod segment of leg 4 is also characteristic of the new species, which would be identifiable, in most cases, by having a ratio of 5.4 or more.

著者

Kazutaka Takahashi Hiroshi Itoh Junya Hirai Kazuaki Tadokoro Koh Nishiuchi

出版者

The Plankton Society of Japan, The Japanese Association of Benthology

雑誌

Plankton and Benthos Research (ISSN:18808247)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.17, no.4, pp.358-368, 2022-11-30 (Released:2022-11-30)

参考文献数

31

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A new species of sapphirinid copepod, Sapphirina doliolettae n. sp. was described from the Kuroshio Extension region in the western North Pacific Ocean. The new species is similar to S. nigromaculata and S. scarlata with respect to the following characteristics: 5-segmented antennule, one inner marginal process on caudal rami, and slender endopods with two apical spines on leg 4. However, it can be distinguished from these congeners by a combination of the following characteristics: the relative length of each segment of the antennule and antenna in both sexes, the width of the fourth pedigerous somite in females, the shape of the anterolateral corner of the genital somite in males and terminal process length of 3rd endopodal segment of leg 2 in males. The mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit I sequences of S. doliolettae showed high interspecific variabilities from other Sapphirina species, including S. nigromaculata (20.2%) and S. scarlata (21.6–21.8%).

著者

Junya Hirai Syun-ichi Urayama Yoshiro Takaki Miho Hirai Keizo Nagasaki Takuro Nunoura

出版者

Japanese Society of Microbial Ecology / Japanese Society of Soil Microbiology / Taiwan Society of Microbial Ecology / Japanese Society of Plant Microbe Interactions / Japanese Society for Extremophiles

雑誌

Microbes and Environments (ISSN:13426311)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.37, no.5, pp.ME21066, 2022 (Released:2022-01-01)

参考文献数

61

被引用文献数

2

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Zooplankton and viruses play a key role in marine ecosystems; however, their interactions have not been examined in detail. In the present study, the diversity of viruses associated with zooplankton collected using a plankton net (mesh size: 100‍ ‍μm) in the subtropical western North Pacific was investigated by fragmented and primer ligated dsRNA sequencing. We obtained 21 and 168 operational taxonomic units (OTUs) of ssRNA and dsRNA viruses, respectively, containing RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp). These OTUs presented average amino acid similarities of 43.5 and 44.0% to the RdRp genes of known viruses in ssRNA viruses and dsRNA viruses, respectively. Dominant OTUs mainly belonged to narna-like and picorna-like ssRNA viruses and chryso-like, partiti-like, picobirna-like, reo-like, and toti-like dsRNA viruses. Phylogenetic ana­lyses of the RdRp gene revealed that OTUs were phylogenetically diverse and clustered into distinct clades from known viral groups. The community structure of the same zooplankton sample was investigated using small subunit (SSU) rRNA sequences assembled from the metatranscriptome of single-stranded RNA. More than 90% of the sequence reads were derived from metazoan zooplankton; copepods comprised approximately 70% of the sequence reads. Although this ana­lysis provided no direct evidence of the host species of RNA viruses, these dominant zooplankton are expected to be associated with the RNA viruses detected in the present study. The present results indicate that zooplankton function as a reservoir of diverse RNA viruses and suggest that investigations of zooplankton viruses will provide a more detailed understanding of the role of viruses in marine ecosystems.

著者

Junya Hirai Yoko Hamamoto Daiske Honda Kiyotaka Hidaka

出版者

The Plankton Society of Japan, The Japanese Association of Benthology

雑誌

Plankton and Benthos Research (ISSN:18808247)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.13, no.2, pp.75-82, 2018-05-30 (Released:2018-05-24)

参考文献数

38

被引用文献数

3 12

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Metagenetic diet analyses of the 18S V9 region were conducted in 40 adult female Calanus sinicus during winter in Tosa Bay (Japan). The majority of prey items were small crustaceans (of Copepoda and Cirripedia) and diatoms, taxa that are dominant in the environment and have been previously reported as important prey items of Calanus. The abundance of sequences attributable to Dinophyta and Chlorophyta was significantly lower in C. sinicus gut contents than in environmental plankton communities, suggesting that C. sinicus avoids prey from these groups. Hydrozoans were also observed, and aplanochytrids (Labyrinthulea) were detected for the first time as a major prey of C. sinicus. Additionally, high proportions of unclassified eukaryote material were observed, suggesting undetected predator–prey relationships in key copepod species in marine ecosystems. The dietary importance of aplanochytrids, heterotrophic protists that accumulate unsaturated fatty acids such as docosahexaenoic acid, has been overlooked in previous research. Calanus sinicus is a key copepod species in the subtropical coastal regions of the western North Pacific, and a major food source for the larvae of commercially important fish; therefore, further investigation into novel prey items such as aplanochytrids is recommended to understand the complex food web structures in marine ecosystems.