Escape performance in the cyclopoid copepod Oithona davisae.

Escaping a predator is one of the keys to success for any living creature. The performance of adults (males, females, and ovigerous females) of the cyclopoid copepod Oithona davisae exposed to an electrical stimulus is analysed as a function of temperature by measuring characteristic parameters associated with the escape movement (distance covered, duration of the appendage movement, mean and maximum escape speeds, Reynolds number). In addition, as a proxy for the efficiency of the motion, the Strouhal number was calculated.

Chemosensory-Related Genes in Marine Copepods.

Living organisms deeply rely on the acquisition of chemical signals in any aspect of their life, from searching for food, mating and defending themselves from stressors. Copepods, the most abundant and ubiquitous metazoans on Earth, possess diversified and highly specified chemoreceptive structures along their body. The detection of chemical stimuli activates specific pathways, although this process has so far been analyzed only on a relatively limited number of species.

Homeostatic swimming of zooplankton upon crowding: the case of the copepod .

Crowding has a major impact on the dynamics of many material and biological systems, inducing effects as diverse as glassy dynamics and swarming. While this issue has been deeply investigated for a variety of living organisms, more research remains to be done on the effect of crowding on the behaviour of copepods, the most abundant metazoans on Earth. To this aim, we experimentally investigate the swimming behaviour, used as a dynamic proxy of animal adaptations, of males and females of the calanoid copepod at different densities of individuals (10, 50 and 100 ind.

Response to salinity and temperature changes in the alien Asian copepod Pseudodiaptomus marinus introduced in the Black Sea.

The salinity tolerance and the effect of temperature were studied on the behavior and motor activity of the nonindigenous Indo-Pacific calanoid copepod Pseudodiaptomus marinus, first found in Sevastopol Bay (Black Sea) in autumn 2016. According to the index of median lethal salinity (LS ), the salinity tolerance range of adult P. marinus collected at 18.

Copepod manipulation of oil droplet size distribution.

Oil spills are one of the most dangerous sources of pollution in aquatic ecosystems. Owing to their pivotal position in the food web, pelagic copepods can provide crucial intermediary transferring oil between trophic levels. In this study we show that the calanoid Paracartia grani can actively modify the size-spectrum of oil droplets.

Distinctive diffusive properties of swimming planktonic copepods in different environmental conditions.

Suspensions of small planktonic copepods represent a special category in the realm of active matter, as their size falls within the range of colloids, while their motion is so complex that it cannot be rationalized according to basic models of self-propelled particles. Indeed, the wide range of individual variability and swimming patterns resemble the behaviour of much larger animals. By analysing hundreds of three-dimensional trajectories of the planktonic copepod Clausocalanus furcatus, we investigate the possibility of detecting how the motion of this species is affected by different external conditions, such as the presence of food and the effect of gravity.

Disentangling physical and biological drivers of phytoplankton dynamics in a coastal system.

This proof-of-concept study integrates the surface currents measured by high-frequency coastal radars with plankton time-series data collected at a fixed sampling point from the Mediterranean Sea (MareChiara Long Term Ecological Research site in the Gulf of Naples) to characterize the spatial origin of phytoplankton assemblages and to scrutinize the processes ruling their dynamics. The phytoplankton community generally originated from the coastal waters whereby species succession was mainly regulated by biological factors (life-cycle processes, species-specific physiological performances and inter-specific interactions). Physical factors, e.

On the relationship between fractal dimension and encounters in three-dimensional trajectories.

The encounter of individuals-prey, predators and mates-living in the surrounding environment is a fundamental process in the life of an organism. Along with the sensory abilities, this process will be regulated by the movement rules adopted by the individual. In this work we discuss the encounter-enhancement effect due to different natatorial modes by calculating the number of encounters realised by differently convoluted trajectories in two homogeneous distributions of particles.