Morphogenesis of Pseudopallene sp. (Pycnogonida, Callipallenidae) II: postembryonic development

Abstract

Pycnogonida (sea spiders) are bizarre marine arthropods that are nowadays most frequently considered as being the sister group to all other chelicerates. The majority of pycnogonid species develops via a protonymphon larva with only three pairs of limbs affiliated with the future head region. Deviating from this, the hatching stage of some representatives shows already an advanced degree of trunk differentiation. Using scanning electron microscopy, fluorescent nucleic staining, and bright-field stereomicroscopy, postembryonic development of Pseudopallene sp. (Callipallenidae), a pycnogonid with an advanced hatching stage, is described. Based on external morphology, six postembryonic stages plus a sub-adult stage are distinguished. The hatching larva is lecithotrophic and bears the chelifores as only functional appendage pair and unarticulated limb buds of walking leg pairs 1 and 2. Palpal and ovigeral larval limbs are absent. Differentiation of walking leg pairs 3 and 4 is sequential. Apart from the first pair, each walking leg goes through a characteristic sequence of three externally distinct stages with two intermittent molts (limb bud-seven podomeres-nine podomeres). First external signs of oviger development are detectable in postembryonic stage 3 bearing three articulated walking leg pairs. Following three more molts, the oviger has attained adult podomere composition. The advanced hatching stages of different callipallenids are compared and the inclusive term "walking leg-bearing larva" is suggested, as opposed to the behavior-based name "attaching larva". Data on temporal and structural patterns of walking leg differentiation in other pycnogonids are reviewed and discussed. To facilitate comparisons of walking leg differentiation patterns across many species, we propose a concise notation in matrix fashion. Due to deviating structural patterns of oviger differentiation in another callipallenid species as well as within other pycnogonid taxa, evolutionary conservation of characteristic stages of oviger development is not apparent even in closely related species.

Three-dimensionally preserved minute larva of a great-appendage arthropod from the early Cambrian Chengjiang biota

“…An alternative, that the nauplius-like larva was ancestral in Euarthropoda, seems unlikely, as early noneucrustacean crustaceans also possessed a hatching larva with the antennula plus three pairs of appendages (5). In either case, however, the phylogenetic position of Leanchoilia (21) supports our conclusion that a larva with just a few anterior limb-bearing segments, which adds segments after hatching [anamorphosis (24)], not only occurs in eucrustaceans (8,14) but was also present in all other major arthropod groups (25)(26)(27), i.e., in the ground pattern of Euarthropoda. Such indirect development with segment-poor larvae can be understood as the evolutionary trigger for an efficient distribution of early euarthropods.…”

Migration ofDrosophilaintestinal stem cells across organ boundaries

“…Subsequently, germ layers split into smaller units with even more restricted fates. Gastrulation in insects is a process by which the ventral domain and polar domain of the blastoderm become internalized to form the 'gastral groove' or 'ventral furrow' (Anderson, 1973;Alwes and Scholtz, 2006;Biffis et al, 2009;Wolff and Hilbrant, 2011;Brenneis et al, 2011). Cells of the gastral groove form the mesoderm (in the center) and the endoderm (anterior and posterior tip).…”

First record of endoparasitism of Pycnogonida in Hydrozoan polyps (Cnidaria) from the Brazilian coast

“…According to Bain (2003) and Lovely (2005), Pycnogonida hatch as juveniles in the fourth or fifth instar with a bud of walking leg 4 (Brenneis et al 2011b), similar to the A. stictus that we observed in the aquaria. However, the hatching of A. stictus juveniles after the consumption of the gallzooid tissues of the Podocoryna n. sp.…”