Osteological development of wild-captured larvae and a juvenile Sebastes koreanus (Pisces, Scorpaenoidei) from the Yellow Sea

Abstract

The osteological development in Sebastes koreanus is described and illustrated on the basis of 32 larvae [6.11-11.10 mm body length (BL)] and a single juvenile (18.60 mm BL) collected from the Yellow Sea. The first-ossified skeletal elements, which are related to feeding, swimming, and respiration, appear in larvae of 6.27 mm BL; these include the jaw bones, palatine, opercular, hyoid arch, and pectoral girdle. All skeletal elements are fully ossified in the juvenile observed in the study. Ossification of the neurocranium started in the frontal, pterotic, and parietal regions at 6.27 mm BL, and then in the parasphenoid and basioccipital regions at 8.17 mm BL. The vertebrae had started to ossify at~7.17 mm BL, and their ossification was nearly complete at 11.10 mm BL. In the juvenile, although ossification of the pectoral girdle was fully complete, the fusion of the scapula and uppermost radial had not yet occurred. Thus, the scapula and uppermost radial fuse during or after the juvenile stage. The five hypurals in the caudal skeleton were also fused to form three hypural elements. The osteological results are discussed from a functional viewpoint and in terms of the comparative osteological development in related species.

Ontogeny of skeletal ossification in Labeo calbasu (Hamilton, 1822) using differential fluorescence staining technique

“…In this study, the red fluorescence emission of the calcium‐binding fluorescent dye Alizarin (1,2‐dihydroxyanthraquinone), when excited with green light, was used in imaging the early and late stages of skeletal ossification in L. calbasu . The skeletal ontology of L. calbasu corroborated with other teleost fishes like Prochilodus lineatus (Hernández et al ., 2016), Sebastes koreanus (Yu & Kim, 2016) and Danio rerio (Bensimon‐Brito et al ., 2016). The ossification of cranial bones and vertebral column started on 2 and 6 dph, respectively, and completed between15 and 20 dph with the complete development of the caudal skeleton.…”

“…The multiplicity of the bones with their complex arrangement in fish requires a vivid study on their ontogeny for the characterization of the skeletal system as well as the differential identification of species based on the skeletal arrangement (Imran et al, 2014). In teleosts, sequence of functional changes in physiological behaviour such as feeding, respiration and swimming is accompanied with parallel sequence of morphological changes in both larvae and juveniles (Yu & Kim, 2016). Therefore, a detailed knowledge about the developmental osteology is important for phylogenetic inferences about the functional relationships among teleost taxa and the environmental preferences of different developmental stages of fish (Koumoundouros et al, 1997(Koumoundouros et al, , 1999.…”