Planktonic foraminifera are heterotrophic sexually reproducing marine protists with an exceptionally complete fossil record that provides unique insights into long-term patterns and processes of evolution. Populations often exhibit strong biases towards either right (dextral) or left (sinistral) shells. Deep-sea sediment cores spanning millions years reveal some species show large rapid fluctua...

Ecological adaptation to environmental changes is a strong driver of evolution, enabling speciation of pelagic plankton in the open ocean without the presence of effective physical barriers to gene flow. The tropical ocean environment, which plays an important role in shaping marine biodiversity, has drastically and frequently changed since the Pliocene. Nevertheless, the evolutionary history o...

Large benthic foraminifera are unicellular calcifying reef organisms that can form symbiotic relationships with a range of different microalgae. However, the cellular functions, such as symbiosis and calcification, and other aspects of cellular physiology in large benthic foraminifera are not fully understood. Amphisorus kudakajimensis was used as a model to determine the detailed cellular char...

Abstract The genus Operculina , a large symbiont-bearing benthic foraminifer, is characterized by high morphological variability showing thick involute to intermediate semi-involute flat evolute tests. Different morphotypes are either considered as ecophenotypes or distinct species. In order test the hypothesis of versus different species, single cell throughput sequencing approach was applied ...

Abstract Amphistegina are common larger benthic foraminifer in coral reefs, with a nearly circumtropical distribution, and major contributors to the CaCO 3 budget of shallow marine environments. The family Amphisteginidae is dominant Cenozoic carbonates. However, its potential as proxy for paleoclimate reconstruction has not been completely explored. intratest variability trace elements lessoni...