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Biology of Symbiotic Apostome Ciliates: Their Diversity and Importance in the Aquatic Ecosystems

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Marine Protists

Abstract

Recently apostome ciliates have been paid more attention in the aquatic ecosystems, since the host population dynamics are more highly influenced by these protists than previously expected. Apostomes are all symbiotic, associated mainly with a wide variety of planktonic and benthic crustaceans and other invertebrates such as cnidarians and chaetognaths . They can also be found within cysts of other apostomes . Some taxa require two distinct hosts.

The life cycles of apostomes are complicated, essentially consisting of four morphologically and functionally different stages: quiescent, encysted phoront s ; feeding trophonts ; divisional, encysted tomont s ; and infective tomite s , with several substages in some taxa. Each metamorphosis accompanies reformation of kineties and organelles. Excystation from phoronts to trophonts is triggered by cues such as molting, injury and predation of hosts. A cell within a phoront is furnished with cilia ready to hatch, and with specialized, membranous organelles related to rapid expansion of food vacuole s. Trophonts with or without a cytostome take nutrients through phagocytosis or pinocytosis, respectively. Some taxa such as Gymnodinoides are exuviotrophic and harmless to the host, while genera such as Vampyrophrya are regarded as parasitoids rather than parasites . Proliferation is mainly due to palintomy to produce numerous tomites within a tomont , whose duration seems to be most greatly influenced by water temperature in the life cycle of apostomes. Tomites actively search for a new host and then transform into phoronts on it.

The present paper briefly reviews previous studies concerning apostomes , and our original data on the histotrophic species Vampyrophrya pelagica infecting copepod s .

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Acknowledgments

We wish to express our sincere thanks to Dr. Fabrice Not (Roscoff Biology Station) for critical reading of the early draft. Thanks are due to Miss M. Hora and K. Yamada for their assistance with electron microscopic observations on V. pelagica, and to Mrs. Nicole Guyard (Roscoff Biology Station) for permission for our citation of the figures appearing in Chatton and Lwoff (1935). This study was partially supported by grants-in-aid from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (Nos. 20380110, 25304031).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Takehara Marine Science Station, Setouchi Field Science Center, Graduate School of Biosphere Science, Hiroshima University, 5-8-1 Minato-machi, Takehara, Hiroshima, 725-0024, Japan

    Susumu Ohtsuka

  2. Graduate School of Science, Kobe University, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan

    Toshinobu Suzaki

  3. Graduate School of Science, Kobe University, 1-1 Rokkodai-cho, Nada-ku, Kobe, 657-8501, Japan

    Atsushi Kanazawa

  4. Graduate School of Education, Okayama University, 3-1-1 Tsushimanaka, Kita-ku, Okayama, 700-8530, Japan

    Motonori Ando

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  1. Susumu Ohtsuka
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  2. Toshinobu Suzaki
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  3. Atsushi Kanazawa
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  4. Motonori Ando
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Correspondence to Susumu Ohtsuka .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Takehara Marine Science Station, Setouchi Field Science Center, Graduate School of Biosphere Science, Hiroshima University, Takehara, Hiroshima, Japan

    Susumu Ohtsuka

  2. Graduate School of Science, Kobe University, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan

    Toshinobu Suzaki

  3. Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science, Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan

    Takeo Horiguchi

  4. Institute of Geology and Paleontology, Graduate School of Science, Tohoku University, Sendai, Miyagi, Japan

    Noritoshi Suzuki

  5. Centre National de la Recherche Scientifi que – CNRS, University Pierre and Marie Curie – UPMC Station Biologique de Roscoff, Roscoff, France

    Fabrice Not

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Ohtsuka, S., Suzaki, T., Kanazawa, A., Ando, M. (2015). Biology of Symbiotic Apostome Ciliates: Their Diversity and Importance in the Aquatic Ecosystems. In: Ohtsuka, S., Suzaki, T., Horiguchi, T., Suzuki, N., Not, F. (eds) Marine Protists. Springer, Tokyo. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-4-431-55130-0_18

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