Diogenes heteropsammicola is a species of hermit crab discovered during samplings between 2012 and 2016 in the shallow waters of the Japanese Amami Islands.[1] This D. heteropsammicola is strongly associated with the walking corals.[1] This hermit crab species is unique due to the discovery that they use living, growing coral as a shell. They live in the inside of the coral and can be distinguished from other types of hermits by their thin chelipeds and leg shape.[1] Crustaceans of this type commonly replace their shell as the organism grows in size, but D. heteropsammicola are the first of their kind to use solitary corals as a shell form.[citation needed] Heteropsammia and Heterocyathus are the two solitary corals that this hermit species has been observed as occupying.[2] These two coral species are also used as a home by symbiotic Sipuncula of the genus Aspidosiphon, which normally occupy the corals that were previously occupied by crabs.[1]
Diogenes heteropsammicola | |
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A, an individual in an aquarium, carrying the coral. B, an individual removed from its host coral. Scale bar: 1 mm. | |
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Arthropoda |
Class: | Malacostraca |
Order: | Decapoda |
Suborder: | Pleocyemata |
Infraorder: | Anomura |
Family: | Diogenidae |
Genus: | Diogenes |
Species: | D. heteropsammicola
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Binomial name | |
Diogenes heteropsammicola Igawa & Kato 2017[1]
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The discoverers of this species are Momoko Igawa and Makoto Kato of Kyoto University, Japan.[1]
References
edit- ^ a b c d e f Igawa M, Kato M (September 2017). "A new species of hermit crab, Diogenes heteropsammicola (Crustacea, Decapoda, Anomura, Diogenidae), replaces a mutualistic sipunculan in a walking coral symbiosis". PLOS ONE. 12 (9): e0184311. Bibcode:2017PLoSO..1284311I. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0184311. PMC 5606932. PMID 28931020.
- ^ Lewis, M. S.; Taylor, J. D. (1966). "Marine Sediments and Bottom Communities of the Seychelles". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series A, Mathematical and Physical Sciences. 259 (1099): 279–290. Bibcode:1966RSPTA.259..279L. doi:10.1098/rsta.1966.0013. ISSN 0080-4614. JSTOR 73292. S2CID 92624660.
External links
edit- Media related to Diogenes heteropsammicola at Wikimedia Commons