@Star_Geezer My daughter asked me to describe what a rotifer is. I told her it's like a legless tardigrade (she knows what a moss piglet is) that grabs stuff with its butt and has twin spinning rotary blades of death on it's head. She IMMEDIATELY demanded that we look at one (which we did!). She loved it!

#Rotifers #BladesOfDeath #Microscopy #Microscope #TinyAnimals #Microscopic

#Rotifers have been studied for >100 years re #microevolution, #EcologicalDynamics & #ecotoxicology. This study presents a #CRISPR-based method for KO mutation of 1 or 2 alleles, and KI mutations, in rotifers with high efficiency @MBLscience #PLOSBiology https://plos.io/3Kb8CAC

New paper in Biodiversity and Conservation sharing data in @gbif:

High diversity and strong habitat preference of #bdelloid #rotifers in the #moss and leaf litter from a small area of urban plain and adjacent hill in #China 🇨🇳

#CiteTheDOI: ✅

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-023-02630-x

Sunday #Plankton #Factoid 🦐🦠

With invention of the microscope in the 1600s, one of the first #zooplankton species described were #rotifers by John Harris and Antonie van Leuwenhoek. Named "wheeled animalcules" because of their distinctive ciliated corona used for feeding. Ubiquitous in most #freshwater systems. Some can be dried out and revived, and though they are dioecious, many are parthenogenic (female clones). Very important to aquatic #FoodWebs.

(Wallace 2002)
https://academic.oup.com/icb/article/42/3/660/724027

The Journal of #Limnology published a special issue on georeferenced #freshwater #biodiversity data. The first three #datapapers are now available— about #rotifers and #diatoms in Italy 🇮🇹 and #zooplankton, #macroinvertebrates and #fish in Uganda 🇺🇬. More papers to come!

The special issue results from a collaboration between GBIF and the Journal of Limnology aimed at filling gaps in primary biodiversity data on freshwater species.

🔗 https://www.jlimnol.it/index.php/jlimnol/issue/view/81

#introduction
Hi there Mastodon!
I'm Ashley. An avid #wetland wonderer with a passion for Bdelloid #rotifers and biotic interactions within freshwater systems. Entering my 3rd year of undergraduate study as a mature ager with way too many research ideas brewing for my post grad journey. I've recently plummeted into the wonderful world of pollination, native pollinators, sonication, and....wasps...wasps, wasps, and wasps! Is a kooky blend of smarts/creepy/sweet/& cheek with a side of #dyslexia.

First talk is by Karine Van Doninck: Bdelloid #rotifers, an extremophile model system in evolutionary biology and space research

Rotifers reproduce by cloning (i.e no sexual reproduction, corner stone of genetic mixture and generation and diversity) and yet are very diverse.

Why?

They still have a non-canonical meiosis, without nuclear division but with homologous recombination.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34613768/

First talk is by Karine Van Doninck: Bdelloid #rotifers, an extremophile model system in evolutionary biology and space research

Rotifers reproduce by cloning (i.e no sexual reproduction, corner stone of genetic mixture and generation and diversity) and yet are very diverse.

Why?

They still have a non-canonical meiosis, without nuclear division but with homologous recombination.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34613768/