Amplexus and Mating Behavior in the Japanese Horseshoe Crab, Tachypleus tridentatus

Botton, Mark L.; Shuster, Carl N.; Sekiguchi, Koichi; Sugita, Hiroaki

doi:10.2108/zsj.13.151

Cited by 33 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 19 publications

(30 reference statements)

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“…Among extant chelicerates, terrestrial forms such as scorpions tend to be restricted to processing oxygen from air (e.g., by means of book lungs). However, marine xiphosurans, which normally extract oxygen from water by means of external book gills, are nevertheless capable of respiration when they journey onto land to spawn 35 . The circulatory and respiratory organs of xiphosurans (horseshoe crabs) are equally complex to those of scorpions 34,36 , and this may contribute to their ability to respire in air and survive on land.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Silurian ancestral scorpion with fossilised internal anatomy illustrating a pathway to arachnid terrestrialisation

Wendruff

Babcock

Wirkner

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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Scorpions are among the first animals to have become fully terrestrialised. Their early fossil record is limited, and fundamental questions, including how and when they adapted to life on land, have been difficult to answer. Here we describe a new exceptionally preserved fossil scorpion from the Waukesha Biota (early Silurian, ca. 437.5-436.5 Ma) of Wisconsin, USA. This is the earliest scorpion yet reported, and it shows a combination of primitive marine chelicerate and derived arachnid characteristics. Elements of the circulatory, respiratory, and digestive systems are preserved, and they are essentially indistinguishable from those of present-day scorpions but share similarities with marine relatives. At this early point in arachnid evolution, physiological changes concomitant with the marine-to-terrestrial transition must have occurred but, remarkably, structural change in the circulatory or respiratory systems appear negligible. Whereas there is no unambiguous evidence that this early scorpion was terrestrial, this evidence suggests that ancestral scorpions were likely capable of forays onto land, a behavior similar to that of extant horseshoe crabs.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Silurian ancestral scorpion with fossilised internal anatomy illustrating a pathway to arachnid terrestrialisation

Wendruff

Babcock

Wirkner

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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“…7) and similar size distributions have been shown in 'Limulus' decheni, from the Palaeogene (Eocene; 56 Ma) of Germany (Hauschke and Wilde 2004). Males also have a curved anterior prosomal arch that allows easier mounting of the female during mating; in T. tridentatus this structure is extremely pronounced and visible dorsally in the form of an anterior scalloping of the prosomal margin (Botton et al 1996) (Fig. 7a).…”

Section: Sexual Dimorphismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tachypleus syriacus (Woodward)—a sexually dimorphic Cretaceous crown limulid reveals underestimated horseshoe crab divergence times

Lamsdell

McKenzie

2015

Org Divers Evol

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The fossil record represents an important test to molecular divergence estimates, with known occurrences representing minimum divergence times for sister taxa. As such, accurately placing fossils in phylogenies is integral to understanding the patterns and processes that shape the tree of life. The chelicerate order Xiphosura comprises classic archetypes of morphological stasis, with the earliest known Ordovician representatives exhibiting all key morphological characteristics of the group. Molecular studies on the four extant species consistently retrieve a basal split between Limulinae and Tachypleinae, but conflict regarding the relationships of the three Asian species. Molecular divergence estimates using either no or a single fossil calibration point infer a Cretaceous or Palaeogene origin for Limulidae and a Palaeogene or Neogene origin for Tachypleinae and Tachypleus. Here, we present male and female specimens of Tachypleus syriacus (='Mesolimulus' syriacus) from the Cretaceous of Lebanon, revealing an anterior scalloped carapace margin in males-a derived condition of sexual dimorphism shared with Tachypleus tridentatus. Morphological phylogenetic analysis of total group Limulidae retrieves a monophyletic Tachypleus with a minimum divergence time during the Cretaceous, while crown-group Tachypleinae and Limulidae are both present during the Triassic, showing that molecular clock analyses have significantly underestimated the divergence times for these taxa.

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“…Two pairs of claspers are found in the Asian horseshoe crabs [Carcinoscorpius rotundicauda, Tachypleus gigas (Müller, 1785) and T. tridentatus (Leach, 1819)], whereas Limulus polyphemus only has one pair of claspers. Botton et al [1996] theorised that the double claspers in T. tridentatus are an adaptation to prolonged amplexus. Conversely, L. polyphemus satellite males are often found in association with amplexed pairs [Brockmann, Smith, 2009;Brockmann et al, 2015] but this phenomenon is seldom observed in the Asian species [Botton et al, 1996;Brockmann, Smith, 2009].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Euproops danae (Belinuridae) cluster confirms deep origin of gregarious behaviour in xiphosurids

Bicknell

Pates

Botton

2019

Arthsel

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Amplexus and Mating Behavior in the Japanese Horseshoe Crab, Tachypleus tridentatus

Cited by 33 publications

References 19 publications

A Silurian ancestral scorpion with fossilised internal anatomy illustrating a pathway to arachnid terrestrialisation

A Silurian ancestral scorpion with fossilised internal anatomy illustrating a pathway to arachnid terrestrialisation

Tachypleus syriacus (Woodward)—a sexually dimorphic Cretaceous crown limulid reveals underestimated horseshoe crab divergence times

Euproops danae (Belinuridae) cluster confirms deep origin of gregarious behaviour in xiphosurids

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