Deep-sea starfish from the Arctic have well-developed eyes in the dark
Asteroids, starfish, are important members of the macro-benthos in almost all marine environments including the deep sea. Starfish are in general assumed to be largely olfactory guided, but recent studies have shown that two tropical shallow water species rely on vision alone to find their habitat a...
Published in: | Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences |
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crroyalsociety:10.1098/rspb.2017.2743 2024-06-23T07:50:38+00:00 Deep-sea starfish from the Arctic have well-developed eyes in the dark Birk, Marie Helene Blicher, Martin E. Garm, Anders Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, North Atlantic Cooperation Ministry of Environment and Food of Denmark 2018 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2017.2743 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rspb.2017.2743 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full-xml/10.1098/rspb.2017.2743 en eng The Royal Society https://royalsociety.org/journals/ethics-policies/data-sharing-mining/ Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences volume 285, issue 1872, page 20172743 ISSN 0962-8452 1471-2954 journal-article 2018 crroyalsociety https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2017.2743 2024-06-04T06:22:50Z Asteroids, starfish, are important members of the macro-benthos in almost all marine environments including the deep sea. Starfish are in general assumed to be largely olfactory guided, but recent studies have shown that two tropical shallow water species rely on vision alone to find their habitat at short distances. Their compound eyes are found at the tip of each arm and they vary little between examined species. Still, nothing is known about vision in the species found in the aphotic zone of the deep sea or whether they even have eyes. Here, 13 species of starfish from Greenland waters, covering a depth range from shallow waters to the deep sea below 1000 m, were examined for the presence of eyes and optical and morphological examinations were used to estimate the quality of vision. Further, species found in the aphotic zone below 320 m were checked for bioluminescence. All species, except the infaunal Ctenodiscus crispatus , had eyes, and two were found to be bioluminescent. Interestingly, one of the species found in the aphotic zone, Novodinia americana , had close to the highest spatial resolution known for starfish eyes along with being bioluminescent. Accordingly, we hypothesize that this species communicates visually using bioluminescent flashes putatively for reproductive purposes. Other species have greatly enhanced sensitivity with few large ommatidia but at the sacrifice of spatial resolution. The discovery of eyes in deep-sea starfish with a huge variation in optical quality and sensitivity indicates that their visual ecology also differs greatly. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Greenland The Royal Society Arctic Greenland Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 285 1872 20172743 |
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The Royal Society |
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crroyalsociety |
language |
English |
description |
Asteroids, starfish, are important members of the macro-benthos in almost all marine environments including the deep sea. Starfish are in general assumed to be largely olfactory guided, but recent studies have shown that two tropical shallow water species rely on vision alone to find their habitat at short distances. Their compound eyes are found at the tip of each arm and they vary little between examined species. Still, nothing is known about vision in the species found in the aphotic zone of the deep sea or whether they even have eyes. Here, 13 species of starfish from Greenland waters, covering a depth range from shallow waters to the deep sea below 1000 m, were examined for the presence of eyes and optical and morphological examinations were used to estimate the quality of vision. Further, species found in the aphotic zone below 320 m were checked for bioluminescence. All species, except the infaunal Ctenodiscus crispatus , had eyes, and two were found to be bioluminescent. Interestingly, one of the species found in the aphotic zone, Novodinia americana , had close to the highest spatial resolution known for starfish eyes along with being bioluminescent. Accordingly, we hypothesize that this species communicates visually using bioluminescent flashes putatively for reproductive purposes. Other species have greatly enhanced sensitivity with few large ommatidia but at the sacrifice of spatial resolution. The discovery of eyes in deep-sea starfish with a huge variation in optical quality and sensitivity indicates that their visual ecology also differs greatly. |
author2 |
Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, North Atlantic Cooperation Ministry of Environment and Food of Denmark |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Birk, Marie Helene Blicher, Martin E. Garm, Anders |
spellingShingle |
Birk, Marie Helene Blicher, Martin E. Garm, Anders Deep-sea starfish from the Arctic have well-developed eyes in the dark |
author_facet |
Birk, Marie Helene Blicher, Martin E. Garm, Anders |
author_sort |
Birk, Marie Helene |
title |
Deep-sea starfish from the Arctic have well-developed eyes in the dark |
title_short |
Deep-sea starfish from the Arctic have well-developed eyes in the dark |
title_full |
Deep-sea starfish from the Arctic have well-developed eyes in the dark |
title_fullStr |
Deep-sea starfish from the Arctic have well-developed eyes in the dark |
title_full_unstemmed |
Deep-sea starfish from the Arctic have well-developed eyes in the dark |
title_sort |
deep-sea starfish from the arctic have well-developed eyes in the dark |
publisher |
The Royal Society |
publishDate |
2018 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2017.2743 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rspb.2017.2743 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full-xml/10.1098/rspb.2017.2743 |
geographic |
Arctic Greenland |
geographic_facet |
Arctic Greenland |
genre |
Arctic Greenland |
genre_facet |
Arctic Greenland |
op_source |
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences volume 285, issue 1872, page 20172743 ISSN 0962-8452 1471-2954 |
op_rights |
https://royalsociety.org/journals/ethics-policies/data-sharing-mining/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2017.2743 |
container_title |
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences |
container_volume |
285 |
container_issue |
1872 |
container_start_page |
20172743 |
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1802641542719995904 |