The life cycles and biodiversity of Pacific coast gastropods were analyzed by videomicroscopy DNA barcoding individuals collected from tide pools in plankton nets a variety shore stations. In many species (Families Calyptraeidae, Cerithiopsidae, Strombidae, Vermetidae, Columbellidae, Nassariidae, Olivellidae, Hermaeidae, Onchidorididae, Gastropteridae, Haminoeidae), the free-swimming veligers r...

Recent expeditions have revealed high levels of biodiversity in the tropical deep-sea, yet little is known about the age or origin of this biodiversity, and large-scale molecular studies are still few in number. In this study, we had access to the largest number of solariellid gastropods ever collected for molecular studies, including many rare and unusual taxa. We used a Bayesian chronogram of...

Pond snails have long been the subject of intense scrutiny by researchers interested in general principles of development and also cellular and molecular neurobiology. Recent work has exploited both these fields of study by examining the ontogeny of the nervous system in these animals. Much of this work has focussed upon the development of specific transmitter phenotypes to provide vignettes of...

BACKGROUND Chemical cues provide aquatic organisms with sensory information that guides behavioural responses and thus interactions among themselves, each other and the environment. Chemical cues are considered important for predator avoidance, foraging, larval settlement and broadcast spawning in aquatic environments. However, the significance of their role as drivers of direct interactions be...

Carbonate communities: The activity of anaerobic methane oxidizing microbes facilitates precipitation of vast quantities of authigenic carbonate at methane seeps. Here we demonstrate the significant role of carbonate rocks in promoting diversity by providing unique habitat and food resources for macrofaunal assemblages at seeps on the Costa Rica margin (400-1850 m). The attendant fauna is surpr...

Shell repair was induced by coating the inner surfaces of gastropod shells with nail polish. In aragonitic gastropods initial deposition on the nail-polish membrane was of aragonite spherulites and, in one species, polygonal calcite crystals; later the normal crossed-lamellar structure of the shell was restored.