Pocket Science: Stealth mode in the sea

The oceans are full of animals that seek safety in numbers, gathering together to confuse predators. But some opt for the opposite strategy.

Alexandrium is part of the sea’s collection of plankton. It’s a single-celled creature but it can create colonies by amassing together in long chains. At their most extreme, these colonies can form large swarms to produce harmful red tides.

As chains, Alexandrium swims and grows faster, but it is vulnerable to predators such as copepods – small relatives of crabs or shrimp. Erik Selander from theTechnical University of Denmark found that when the chains detect the chemical traces of copepods, they break apart. By turning back into single cells, they make themselves harder to find. They also swim at a slower pace to avoid creating telltale movements in the water. When threatened by predators, these plankton enter stealth mode.

Alexandrium isn’t the only ocean resident to use a split-and-survive strategy. The larva of the sand dollar avoids being spotted by splitting itself into two identical clones. Sand dollars are relatives of sea urchins. An adult is a flat, round disc but a larva (known as a pluteus) is a very different six-armed creature. A pluteus can swim but not very quickly, and certainly not fast enough to escape a hungry fish.

Dawn Vaughan and Richard Strathmann found that if a pluteus detects the smell of a fish, it clones itself in two. It grows a small bud that detaches and becomes a second genetically identical larva. The two clones are half the size of the original, each just an eighth of a millimetre across. Like Alexandrium, the sand dollar also has a stealth mode, and one that involves virgin birth!

Reference: Selander, Jakobsen, Lombard & Kiørboe. 2011. Grazer cues induce stealth behavior in marine dinoflagellates. PNAS http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1011870108

Vaughn, D., Strathmann, R.R. (2008). Predators Induce Cloning in Echinoderm Larvae. Science, 319(5869), 1503-1503. DOI: 10.1126/science.1151995

Image by Tashiror

There are 6 Comments. Add Yours.

  1. M.Semones
    February 21, 2011

    Neat! Quick note for general knowledge: a lot of researchers in the area of “red tides” prefer the term harmful algal bloom, due to the diversity of impacts blooms of different species can have; some aren’t even visible when at extremely toxic or damaging levels, and they can be a plethora of colors when they are visible. Although Alexandrium, specifically, can create red tides, so it’s accurate for this particular type. Thanks for writing!

  2. Ed Yong
    February 21, 2011

    Is “algae” right? I originally wrote that and then wasn’t sure.

  3. Robert
    February 22, 2011

    The Wikipedia entry for Algae lists Dinoflagellates as a type of red algae, and Wikipedia is legitimate enough for my needs. :

  4. M.Semones
    February 23, 2011

    Yeah, they’re considered as algae in journals and textbooks. The definition of “algae” is is a bit fuzzy–wikipedia says they are “typically” autotrophic. Some of the cool things that happen are mixotrophy (combination of heterotrophy and autotrophy) and kleptoplasty (stealing chloroplasts from other algae after eating them and then incorporating them into their own body as working organelles). I’m not an expert on the topic, but did a couple stints in labs studying algae, one of which is studying the phylogenetic relationships between different families. The best description is “it’s complicated!” There’s tons of horizontal gene transfer, and a lot of the challenge of describing them is getting around the conventional desire for strict, straightforward categorization. Calling them plankton is a good way to get around that confusion if you don’t need or want to address it.

  5. Matt B.
    February 23, 2011

    The description of the sand dollar’s method seems contradictory. Does the pluteus split into 2 equal halves, or does it create a smaller offshoot?

  6. Cigarette electrique
    April 25, 2011

    anybody can tell if it works with? hash too?

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